HF (Algeria) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

In an asylum and human-rights appeal, an appellate tribunal must address material evidence, but it need not treat another person’s detention or ill-treatment as a reliable guide where the circumstances are materially different. A tribunal’s reasoning is sufficient if, read fairly, it explains why the individual claimant would not face the feared risk.

Article 8 requires an assessment of the established family and private life and whether removal would cause sufficiently serious prejudice to amount to a breach. Permission to appeal was refused.

The appellant, an Algerian national, claimed asylum after alleging that he had informed against the GIA, received threats, and faced inadequate state protection. An Immigration Judge initially accepted his account and found that he would be at risk, but reconsideration proceedings resulted in a further dismissal by a panel chaired by Senior Immigration Judge Chalkley.

The case had previously been remitted by the Court of Appeal under the principles in DK (Serbia) v SSHD [2006] EWCA Civ 1747, with the favourable credibility findings preserved. The appellant challenged the renewed dismissal, principally on the treatment of evidence concerning his friend Kamal’s alleged torture and detention, and on the tribunal’s Article 8 assessment.

1. Permission refused. The tribunal’s conclusions that the appellant would not face a real risk of persecution or Article 3 ill-treatment from the GIA or the Algerian authorities were carefully reasoned and sustainable.
2. Kamal’s treatment was not determinative. It might provide supporting evidence, but the appellant’s circumstances were materially different. Although the tribunal could have explained this expressly, its reasoning was sufficient.
3. The tribunal was entitled to distinguish ordinary civil or criminal detention from political, military, high-security, secret or unacknowledged detention. The anticipated conditions did not establish persecution or treatment contrary to Article 3.
4. The further submissions concerning possible additional charges and questioning did not establish an arguable error of law.
5. The Article 8 assessment was lawful. The tribunal accepted that family and private life had been established and that Article 8(1) was engaged, but was entitled to conclude that removal would not cause sufficiently serious prejudice to amount to a breach.
6. Lord Justice Pill agreed with Lord Justice Richards. Order: application refused.

• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal — The appeal was dismissed on asylum and human-rights grounds after reconsideration.
• Court of Appeal (Civil Division) — The application for permission to appeal was refused.