The High Court has refused an applicant leave to seek judicial review of a negative asylum recommendation, finding that his proposed grounds did not raise a substantial case for quashing the report.
In a judgment delivered on 11 March 2011, Mr Justice Cooke considered a report made by the Refugee Applications Commissioner under section 13 of the Refugee Act 1996. The applicant had lodged an appeal to the Refugee Appeals Tribunal, but no further step had been taken on it pending the judicial review application.
The applicant claimed to be Malaysian and to have faced threats and attacks because he practised Buddhism. The Commissioner’s report found his account seriously lacking in credibility, citing inconsistencies about when attacks occurred, whether he had been beaten, and when he left Malaysia. It also noted that he had arrived in Ireland in 2005 but did not seek asylum until detained by gardaí in 2007.
The applicant argued that the report was flawed because it did not determine whether he was a practising Buddhist. The court rejected that ground. It said the report contained no finding that he was not Buddhist and should therefore be read as accepting that part of his claim. The judge said the applicant could proceed on that basis before the Tribunal.
The court also said that disbelief of the claimed past attacks did not prevent the applicant from arguing to the Tribunal, using appropriate and up-to-date country information, that Buddhists in Malaysia faced a current risk of persecution. The judgment did not determine that such a risk existed.
A second ground concerned the fact that one officer conducted the section 11 interview while two other officers compiled and signed the section 13 report. The court found no statutory requirement for the report writers to have conducted the interview. It also noted that the credibility findings relied on contradictions and the applicant’s conduct, not his demeanour during the interview.
The court decided to hear the judicial review application rather than leave the issues to the statutory appeal, citing the time elapsed since the report and the value of clarifying the credibility issues for an appeal without an oral hearing. It refused leave. The judgment did not decide the asylum appeal or make an order quashing the report.