AM was represented by Amanda Weston QC of Garden Court Chambers, leading Mikhil Karnik of Garden Court North Chambers, Manchester and Karen Halliwell of Paragon Law, Nottingham.
The Court of Appeal has dismissed the Secretary of State’s appeal against a declaration granted by the Upper Tribunal requiring the Secretary of State to regularise the immigration status of a man from Belarus with serious mental illness, who has been in the UK for over 20 years, and cannot be removed for practical reasons, including a dispute over his nationality. Building on the earliest known article 8 ‘limbo’ case (R v SSHD [2006] EWCA Civ 719, a Palestinian case which was brought by Ms Weston in 2006 in reliance on the Strasbourg judgment in Mendizabal v France 51431/99 [2006] ECHR 34, (2010) 50 EHRR 50) the Upper Tribunal had applied the four-stage test in RA (Iraq) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2019] EWCA Civ 850 and found that AM’s circumstances were truly exceptional and made a declaration that continuing to refuse to grant AM leave to remain was a disproportionate interference with his article 8 rights.
