The High Court has refused a Georgian applicant’s request to quash a decision denying him refugee and subsidiary protection, finding that the tribunal’s credibility assessment was reasonably open to it on the evidence.
Mr Justice Barr delivered the judgment electronically on 6 December 2024 in a judicial review of an International Protection Appeals Tribunal decision made on 14 June 2023. The tribunal had affirmed a recommendation that G.S. receive neither form of protection.
G.S.’s account was that he began an affair with his cousin’s wife in September 2022 and was assaulted by his cousin on three occasions. He said he feared further harm, left Georgia on 9 November 2022 and later sought protection in Ireland. The tribunal rejected the core account, apart from his nationality, citing concerns including the circumstances of the alleged assaults, his failure to report them to police and the late emergence of his claim that his cousin served in the Georgian armed forces.
G.S. argued that the tribunal’s findings were irrational. He challenged its treatment of the assaults as a group, its assessment of his reasons for not seeking police protection, and its conclusion that leaving Georgia to avoid harm from one cousin was implausible.
The High Court stressed that judicial review is not an appeal on the merits. It assessed the tribunal’s decision as a whole and said credibility findings must have a sound factual basis and intelligible reasons. The judge concluded that the tribunal had set out the applicant’s evidence about each alleged assault and could consider common concerns across the accounts together. The court also pointed to his initial questionnaire answer that he had lacked the “possibility and time” to report the matter, and the absence of supporting country information for his later assertions about police protection.
The court held that the tribunal was entitled to consider the late introduction of the armed-forces claim when weighing credibility. It also rejected G.S.’s argument that the tribunal had made a general rule against protection claims based on threats from one person. In the circumstances of this case, the judge found its assessment of his decision to leave was not irrational.
The court refused to set aside the tribunal decision and refused all relief sought in the notice of motion. It did, however, extend the time for bringing the judicial review, noting that the application had been commenced one week out of time and accepting the explanation given by the applicant’s solicitor. The parties were given two weeks to make written submissions on the terms of the final order and costs. The matter was listed for mention on 16 January 2025 to make final orders.