AIT Since the breakdown of the ceasefire, heightened security in the capital has restricted the operations there of the LTTE, who are focusing on ‘high-profile’ targets. The background evidence does not show that Tamils in Colombo who have stopped supporting the Tigers, or who support parties opposed to them, are at real risk of reprisals, absent some feature bringing them to prominence. The conclusion to that effect in PS (LTTE – internal flight – sufficiency of protection) Sri Lanka CG [2004] UKIAT 297, which this determination updates and supersedes, is thus affirmed.
There is no good evidence that the LTTE maintain a computerized database of their opponents, such that new arrivals in Colombo can be checked against it. Checks are, on the other hand, run on a computerized database by immigration officers when passengers arrive at Bandaranaike International Airport, or by members of the security forces when people are detained, but there is no good evidence to show that everyone who has in the past been detained and questioned about possible involvement with the LTTE is on that database. On the contrary, it is likely to contain the names only of those who are of serious interest to the authorities.
The twelve ‘risk factors’ listed in LP (LTTE area – Tamils – Colombo – risk?) Sri Lanka CG [2007] UKAIT 00076 can usefully be divided into risk factors per se, one or more of which are likely to make a person of adverse interest to the authorities, and ‘background factors’, which neither singly nor in combination are likely to create a real risk, but which in conjunction with risk factors per se will intensify the risk.
A failed asylum seeker who hails from the north or east of Sri Lanka and who has no relatives or friends to turn to in Colombo will generally be able to relocate there in safety and without undue harshness. Those arriving without their National Identity Card should be able to get a replacement without too much difficulty, while the great majority of those detained at checkpoints and in cordon-and-search operations are released within a short time. A generous support package is available for five years from the International Organisation for Migration to those who return voluntarily. Those who refuse to do so cannot pray in aid the prospect of being destitute in Colombo.
PR (medical facilities) Sri Lanka CG [2002] UKIAT 4269 is, owing to its antiquity, no longer to be treated as country guidance on the availability of medical treatment for returnees. The guidance in PS and LP, however, has been considered and approved by the European Court of Human Rights in NA v United Kingdom, handed down on 17th July 2008.
[2008] UKAIT 00063
Bailii
England and Wales
Updated: 22 July 2021; Ref: scu.277818