SC (Turkey) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

In reviewing an asylum tribunal’s credibility assessment, alleged errors must be considered in the context of the determination as a whole. A tribunal must not decide an appellant’s evidence first and then treat expert evidence as an afterthought, as explained in Mibanga [2005] EWCA Civ 367. However, a tribunal that evaluates several strands of evidence together does not fall into that error merely because it rejects or gives limited weight to expert evidence. An arguable mistake concerning one matter will not justify permission to appeal where it is immaterial to the overall credibility assessment and other strong findings independently undermine the account.

The appellant claimed asylum after alleging persecution in Turkey because of her Kurdish ethnicity, Alevi faith and political activity. The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal rejected her account at a reconsideration hearing promulgated on 23 February 2006, including her reliance on documents said to demonstrate continuing criminal proceedings.

On a renewed application for permission to appeal, the appellant argued that the tribunal had misunderstood country information about the replacement of Turkey’s State Security Courts and had wrongly rejected an expert report concerning the documents. The central issue was whether the arguable error about the timing of the court changes materially vitiated the tribunal’s credibility findings.

1. The renewed application for permission to appeal was refused. Longmore LJ agreed with the judgment of Maurice Kay LJ.

2. The tribunal had correctly directed itself on the assessment of disputed documents by reference to Tanveer Ahmed. Its conclusion that the documents were not authentic was based on several matters, although they appeared authentic at first glance.

3. There was an arguable error in the tribunal’s treatment of the country information. The tribunal understood paragraph 11.02 of the November 2006 Country Information Report as showing that State Security Courts had been abolished and replaced in 1999. Properly read with paragraph 11.20, implementation of the replacement by Serious Felony Courts occurred in May 2004, after the dates on the documents. The tribunal’s reliance on the old nomenclature was therefore arguably flawed.

4. The error had to be assessed in the context of the determination as a whole. The tribunal had not fallen into the error identified in Mibanga [2005] EWCA Civ 367, namely deciding the appellant’s evidence first and then asking whether expert evidence should alter that conclusion. It had assessed a substantial and complex body of evidence together, and was not required to determine the significance of each item in isolation.

5. Other findings were particularly strong and were not challenged. They included the implausible length and lethargic progress of the alleged proceedings, the absence of recent supporting documents, the failure to investigate the outcome of a recent hearing in Turkey, the extreme improbability of the prison photographs, and numerous discrepancies in the appellant’s account and the evidence of her brothers.

6. Viewed in the round, the tribunal had approached credibility carefully and on a correct legal basis. The country-information error was not material and did not vitiate the credibility findings as a whole. It could not sustain an appeal with a real prospect of success.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): Permission to appeal had been refused on the papers by Latham LJ. On renewal, the application was refused on 21 September 2007.
• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: A reconsideration decision promulgated on 23 February 2006 rejected the appellant’s asylum claim.