Mohsin Khan v. Torture Claims Appeal Board and Another

HCAL 1466/2018

[2021] HKCFI 1198

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST No 1466 of 2018

BETWEEN

Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review

NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord 53 r 3)

Following:

	consideration of the documents only;  or
	consideration of the documents and oral submissions by (counsel for) the Applicant in open court / the Applicant being absent in open court;

Order by Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan:

Leave to apply for judicial review refused.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.The Applicant is a 32-year-old national of Pakistan who entered Hong Kong illegally on 7 March 2009 and was arrested by the police on the same day. After he was referred to the Immigration Department for investigation, he raised a torture claim later taken as a non-refoulement claim on the basis that if he returned to Pakistan he would be harmed or killed by the local supporters of the political party Muttahida Qaumi Movement (“MQM”) for refusing to pay extortion money. He was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim.

2.The Applicant was born and raised in Karachi City, Sindh Province, Pakistan. After leaving school he ran a convenience store in his home district during which he would from time to time receive extortion notes from the local MQM people for money for the support of their political party, which the Applicant would comply as he did not want to make trouble with them.

3.However, on one occasion in late 2008 when the note from the MQM people demanded for a large sum which he could not afford, and when he was unable to pay, he started to receive threatening notes that he would be killed, and so he closed down his store and on 4 March 2009 departed Pakistan for China, and from there he later sneaked into Hong Kong, and upon his arrest by the police he then raised his non-refoulement claim for protection, for which he completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 23 October 2014 and attended a screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

4.Whilst released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim, the Applicant was again arrested by the police on 2 January 2014 for undertaking unauthorized employment and using a false identity card, for which he was subsequently convicted and sentenced to prison for 17 months.        

5.By a Notice of Decision dated 15 May 2015 the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the applicable grounds including risk of torture under Part VIIC of the Immigration Ordinance, Cap 115 (“Torture Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap 383 (“HKBOR”) (“BOR 3 Risk”), and risk of persecution with reference to the non-refoulement principle under Article 33 of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (“Persecution Risk”).

6.In his decision the Director took into account all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and assessed the level of risk of harm from those local MQM people upon his return to Pakistan as low due to the absence of any past ill-treatment from them, that it was criminal extortion from those MQM people without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant if resorted to, and that reliable and objective Country of Origin Information (“COI”) shows that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Pakistan with a large population of 196 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 796,000 square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied adult with working experience to move to other parts of Pakistan away from his home district in large cities such as Lahore where it would be difficult if not impossible for those local MQM people to locate him.

7.By a Notice of Further Decision dated 5 December 2016 the Director again rejected the Applicant’s claim in the absence of any response from him to an earlier invitation to submit additional facts which may be relevant to his non-refoulement claim on all applicable grounds for non-refoulement protection including any other absolute or non-derogable rights under HKBOR including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”).

8.By then the Applicant was already in the process of appealing to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the earlier decision of the Director, the notice of which was filed on 28 May 2015, and for which he attended an oral hearing on 15 May 2017 before the Board during which he gave evidence and answered questions put to him by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 13 July 2018 his appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the decisions of the Director.

9.In its decision the Board accepted the Applicant’s claim of being extorted by the local MQM people for money but found no evidence of him ever being threatened or ill-treated by them physically other than some threatening notes, and that in the absence of any evidence of official involvement that state/police protection would be available to him upon his return to Pakistan as well as reasonable internal relocation for him to move safely to other areas of Pakistan without any risk of being located that his claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.   

10.On 25 July 2018 the Applicant filed his Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of both the decisions of the Director and the Board, but no ground for seeking relief was given in his Form, and in his supporting affirmation of the same date he merely repeated his claim that his life would still be in danger if returned to his home country but without putting forward any proper ground for his intended challenge, nor did he request any oral hearing for his application. As such and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in his process before the Director or the Board or in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for his intended challenge.

11.As has been repeatedly emphasized by the Court of Appeal, judicial review does not operate as a rehearing of a non-refoulement claim when the proper occasion for the Applicant to present and articulate his claim is in the screening process and interview before the Immigration Department and in the process before the Board where the evaluation of the risk of harm is primarily a matter for the Director and the Board as they are entitled to make such evaluation based on the evidence available to them that the court will not usurp their role as primary decision makers in the absence of any legal error or procedural unfairness or irrationality in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, as judicial review is not an avenue for revisiting the assessment by them in the hope that the court may consider the matter afresh: Re Lakhwinder Singh [2018] HKCA 246; Re Daljit Singh [2018] HKCA 328; Re Mudannayakalage Chaminda Pushpa Kumara [2018] HKCA 400; and Nupur Mst v Director of Immigration [2018] HKCA 524.

12.In the Applicant’s case, the fact is that it has been established by both the Director and the Board in their respective decision that the risk of harm in his claim is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for him to relocate to other parts of Pakistan, there is simply no justification to afford him with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.     

13.In the premises and having considered the decisions of both the Director and the Board with rigorous examination and anxious scrutiny, I do not find any error of law or procedural unfairness in either of them, nor any failure on their part to apply high standards of fairness in their consideration and assessment of the Applicant’s claim.

14.For these reasons I am not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and I accordingly refuse his leave application.

Dated the 30^th day of April 2021.

Where leave to apply has been granted, Applicants and their legal advisers are reminded of their obligation to reconsider the merits of their application in the light of the Respondent’s evidence

Form CALL-1