Grand Chamber – The applicant alleged that his expulsion by the Belgian authorities had violated Articles 2 and 3 of the Convention and that he had been subjected in Greece to treatment prohibited by Article 3; he also complained of the lack of a remedy under Article 13 of the Convention that would enable him to have his complaints examined. ECtHR noted UNHCR’s claim (in a letter to the Belgian government in April 2009) that the Fourth Section in KRS had apparently overlooked some of the criticisms that it had made of Greece. No reference had been made to whether conditions of reception conformed to regional and international standards of human rights protection or whether asylum seekers had access to fair consideration of their asylum applications or if they were able to exercise their rights under the Geneva Convention. The Grand Chamber reviewed the numerous reports and materials that had been generated about the situation in Greece since the KRS decision. It observed that these all agreed about the deficiencies of the asylum procedure in Greece. The court therefore concluded that the situation in Greece was known to the Belgian authorities; that seeking assurances from the Greek government that the applicant faced no risk of treatment contrary to ECHR was not sufficient to ensure adequate protection against the risk where reliable sources had reported practices that were tolerated by the authorities and which were manifestly contrary to the principles of the Convention; and that the Aliens Office of the Belgian government ‘systematically applied the Dublin Regulation . . without so much as considering the possibility of making an exception’
Held: There had been a violation by Belgium of article 3 of EHCR because by sending the applicant back to Greece, the Belgian authorities exposed him to detention and living conditions there which were in breach of that article.
Judges:
Jean-Paul Costa, P
Citations:
30696/09, [2011] ECHR 108, [2011] ECHR 748, 31 BHRC 313, [2011] INLR 533, (2011) 53 EHRR 2
Links:
Statutes:
European Convention on Human Rights 3
Cited by:
Cited – EM (Eritrea), Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for The Home Department SC 19-Feb-2014
SSHD must examine safety of country for return
The Court was asked: ‘Is an asylum seeker or refugee who resists his or her return from the United Kingdom to Italy (the country in which she or he first sought or was granted asylum) required to establish that there are in Italy ‘systemic . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Human Rights, Immigration
Updated: 01 September 2022; Ref: scu.428267
