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

An appellate court hearing an asylum challenge on a point of law should not re-evaluate a tribunal’s assessment of oral credibility merely because another fact-finder might have reached a different conclusion. A tribunal need not address every item of evidence or submission. It must consider sufficient material and give sufficient reasons to make its conclusion intelligible and persuasive. Corroboration is not a legal prerequisite to an asylum claim, but the tribunal may take account of the absence of readily available witnesses who could support a material part of the account. Statutory conduct factors must be assessed with all other material and may bear on the core credibility issue.

The appellant challenged the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal’s dismissal of his appeal against refusal of his asylum, humanitarian protection and human-rights claims. He alleged that he faced persecution or serious ill-treatment in Turkey because of his political activities, Kurdish ethnicity and Alevi faith. Following an earlier decision which had been found unsafe, the Tribunal conducted a full rehearing and rejected his account after hearing oral evidence and considering documentary and medical evidence. The renewed application raised alleged irrationality, perversity and inadequate reasoning. The central issue was whether the Tribunal had erred in law in its credibility assessment.

Application refused. Lord Justice May gave the judgment, and Lord Justice Laws agreed entirely.

1. The Court of Appeal’s jurisdiction was limited to an error of law. A credibility assessment based on the reliability of oral evidence was not ordinarily amenable to appellate interference merely because the evidence might have been assessed differently.
2. The Tribunal was not required to address every conceivable point, submission or item of evidence. It was required to address matters sufficient to support a sufficiently reasoned and persuasive conclusion. Its detailed summary of the evidence and its stated reasons met that standard.
3. An asylum claimant’s evidence does not require corroboration as a matter of law. Nevertheless, a tribunal may take account of the absence of evidence from persons who, on the claimant’s own account, could readily have been called to support a material part of the claim.
4. The Tribunal was entitled to treat significant omissions from the asylum interviews, the implausibility of the account of the appellant’s arrival in the United Kingdom, and the unexplained coincidence concerning his cousin as relevant to the core credibility assessment. Section 8 of the 2004 Act required the matter to be considered with all other material; it did not make the Tribunal’s assessment irrational.
5. The Tribunal had considered the appellant’s explanation for the omissions, the medical reports and the other matters relied upon. Its conclusion that the essential account was untrue disclosed no arguable point of law. The renewed application was therefore refused.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division): refused the renewed application for permission to appeal, holding that the Tribunal’s decision disclosed no error of law.
2. Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: after a full rehearing, dismissed the appellant’s appeal against refusal of his asylum, humanitarian protection and human-rights claims.
3. Earlier Tribunal proceedings: an earlier appeal dismissal in July 2005 was found unsafe, and a senior immigration judge directed a full rehearing.