The Court of Appeal has ordered a Georgian international protection applicant to pay the State's reasonable costs after he withdrew an appeal over his transfer from Ireland to France under the Dublin III system.
The applicant, identified as GM, had applied for protection in France in March 2022 before travelling to Ireland and making another application that September. France accepted responsibility for his case, and Irish authorities decided in February 2023 that he should be transferred there.
GM challenged that decision. His case included medical evidence claiming that returning him to France would create a serious risk of suicide. The International Protection Appeals Tribunal rejected his appeal in September 2023, and the High Court later rejected his judicial review challenge.
GM was transferred to France on 13 February 2024. He subsequently left France and travelled to the United Kingdom. By October 2024 his solicitors had informed the State of that fact, and by the time his Court of Appeal case was heard in April 2025 he was in Northern Ireland and had applied for international protection in the UK.
The State argued that his move raised fundamental questions about whether the Irish appeal had become moot or whether any order returning him to Ireland could still have practical effect.
During the April hearing, the Court sought more detailed information about when and how GM had left France, his current circumstances and his mental health in light of the earlier medical evidence. His counsel could not provide those details. Later that day, GM instructed his solicitors to withdraw the appeal.
Mr Justice Anthony Collins held that GM had failed in his continuing duty to provide the court with all material information relevant to the case. The court expressly disapproved of that lack of candour.
However, because the State had already known he was in the UK and had been able to address mootness and futility, the court found no additional prejudice justifying enhanced costs.
GM was therefore ordered to pay the respondents' reasonable appeal costs on the ordinary party-and-party basis.