The High Court refused an application for leave to seek judicial review of a decision affirming a recommendation that a Pakistani applicant should not be declared a refugee.
Mr Justice McDermott delivered the judgment on 26 July 2013. The applicant sought an order quashing the Refugee Appeals Tribunal’s decision of 2 June 2009. The court’s task at this stage was to decide whether he had shown substantial grounds for permission to pursue judicial review; it was not hearing an appeal on the merits of his refugee claim.
The applicant alleged that a powerful neighbouring family was behind the killings of his father and uncle, repeated police complaints against him, and his detention and ill-treatment. He said the dispute began after his father tried to buy land bordering the family farm. He also claimed that he was abducted in Rawalpindi in 2007 and held for a year, and that he came to Ireland after his release. These were claims advanced in his asylum case, not findings made by the High Court.
The Tribunal had rejected his account on several grounds, including his return to Sargodha after release, the address on an identity card, his route through the United Kingdom before travelling to Ireland, and whether he could relocate within Pakistan. The applicant challenged aspects of the Tribunal’s credibility assessment and argued that internal relocation had been wrongly considered as part of deciding whether he had a well-founded fear of persecution.
The High Court held that internal relocation could be considered as part of the overall refugee-status assessment. It said the Tribunal had considered the applicant’s circumstances and was entitled to conclude that relocation elsewhere in Pakistan was available, even if the events he described had occurred. The judgment noted that the alleged dispute had local, non-state origins, and that the applicant had obtained varying degrees of assistance from police and courts in Pakistan.
The court also found that the Tribunal’s credibility conclusions were not unreasonable on the material before it. It said the weight given to the evidence was for the decision-maker, and the High Court could not act as an appeal court. The court concluded that the applicant had established no substantial ground for leave on any of the grounds advanced and refused the application.
The ruling concerned permission to bring judicial review proceedings. It did not grant the requested order quashing the Tribunal decision.