News
The Iranian government should immediately reverse its threat of prosecution against Iran's most prominent independent human rights organisation, reported Human Rights Watch, referring to the interior ministry announcement that the Centre for Defence of Human Rights (CDHR), co-founded by the 2003 Nobel peace laureate Shirin Ebadi, was an illegal organisation. Read more
Legislation
The Immigration (Continuation of Leave) (Notices) Regulations 2006 were laid before Parliament on 10 August 2006. They specify when an application for variation of leave is to be treated as decided. Read more
The Immigration (Notices) (Amendment) Regulations 2006 No. 2168 make provision for Notices of Decision to state the country or territory to which it is proposed to remove the affected party, including the possibility of naming dual destinations. Read more
Cases
In Swash v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2006] EWCA Civ 1093 (26 July 2006) the Court of Appeal were of the view that an Immigration Judge carrying out second stage reconsideration could be expected to read the original determination without any apprehension of bias arising. If good reasons were present for not so doing, an application should be made speedily after the case is transferred by those who have identified an error of law. Read more
Tribunal
In HGMO (Relocation to Khartoum) Sudan CG [2006] UKAIT 00062 (03 August 2006) the Tribunal gave guidance on the evaluation of refugee claims based on activities in the UK, on the test for determining whether internal relocation is unduly harsh, and stressed the need for expert witnesses to show their evidence gives a balanced picture, in the sense of identifying evidence for and against a particular conclusion. Regarding the Sudan itself, the Tribunal found that given the living conditions, even for non-Arab Darfuris in Khartoum who are IDPs, are not markedly different from the living conditions in Sudan as a whole, so that internal relocation was not unduly harsh, albeit that the circumstances of a female head of household living in a camp would require careful scrutiny. Whilst identifying several categories of individual at risk, they concluded that involuntary returnees to Sudan generally would not be in danger. Read more
