Iqbal Mazhar Alias Mazhar Iqbal v. Torture Claims Appeal Board

HCAL 1358/2018

[2021] HKCFI 2029

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST No 1358 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 the Applicant 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 46-year-old national of Pakistan who entered Hong Kong illegally on 10 May 2015 and surrendered to the Immigration Department on 28 May 2015 when he raised a non-refoulement claim on the basis that if he returned to Pakistan he would be harmed or killed by a neighbor over a land dispute in his home district. He was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim.

2.The Applicant was born and raised in Village Maj, Mandi Bahauddin, Pakistan. He did not receive any formal education, and spent his adult life working as a farmer on his father’s farmland in his home village, which was however coveted by his neighbor Mukahtar who also owned land adjourning to his father’s farmland which had led to frequent conflicts between the two families, and to avoid such conflicts the Applicant in 2007 departed Pakistan for China and sneaked into Hong Kong where he raised a torture claim but which he later withdrew in December 2012 when he heard that the land dispute between his family and Mukahtar had been resolved, and was subsequently repatriated to Pakistan in February 2013.

3.Upon returning to his home village, the issue over the farmland between Mukahtar and the Applicant’s family again arose, and when Mukahtar and his men later forcefully occupied the land and drove the Applicant and his family away with death threats, and after another incident during which the Applicant and his brother were assaulted by Mukahtar and his followers, the Applicant became fearful for his life and fled with his family to Islamabad, and on 2 May 2015 he again departed Pakistan for China, and from there he sneaked into Hong Kong and raised his non-refoulement claim for protection, for which he completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 28 July 2017 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

4.By a Notice of Decision dated 6 September 2017 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 his absolute or non-derogable rights under the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap 383 (“HKBOR”) being violated including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of 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”).

5.In his decision the Director took into account of all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and assessed the level of risk of harm from his neighbor Mukahtar and his followers upon his return to Pakistan as low due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that it was a private land dispute between them 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”) show that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Pakistan with a large population of 204 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 part of Pakistan away from his home district in large cities such as Lahore or Islamabad where he had stayed before without incidents and where it would be difficult if not impossible for Mukahtar to locate him.

6.The Applicant then lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which he attended an oral hearing on 20 April 2018 before the Board during which he gave evidence and answered questions put to him by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 15 June 2018 his appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the decision of the Director.

7.In its decision the Board found even on the Applicant’s own evidence that Mukhatar having got rid of the Applicant and his family and taken the land successfully that there is no reason why he would still have any adverse interest in the Applicant after all these years, that in any event in the absence of any official involvement that state/police protection would be available to the Applicant upon his return to Pakistan as well as reasonable internal relocation for him to move safely to other area away from his home district without any risk of being located by Mukhatar that his claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.  

8.On 11 July 2018 the Applicant filed his Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in his Form, and in his supporting affirmation of the same date he merely stated that he rejects the decision as it disregarded his dangerous situation but without providing any details or elaboration as to how it did so, nor did he put forward any other proper ground at the hearing of his application for his intended application. As such and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in his process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for his intended challenge.

9.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.

10.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 the Applicant’s claim is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for him to relocate to other part 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.

11.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.

12.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 16^th day of July 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