Case Document

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HCAL 642/2021

[2025] HKCFI 5574

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 642 OF 2021

BETWEEN
	Ha Thuy Quynh	Applicant
	and
	Torture Claims Appeal Board	Putative Respondent
	and
	Director of Immigration	Putative Interested Party

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 / the Applicant being absent in open court;

Order by Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan:

Leave to apply for judicial review be refused.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.The Applicant is a 23-year-old national of Vietnam who entered Hong Kong illegally on 26 May 2019 and was arrested by police on the following day on 27 May 2019. After she was referred to the Immigration Department for investigation, she raised a non‑refoulement claim for protection on the basis that if she returned to Vietnam she would be harmed or killed by her creditor over her unpaid debts. She was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of her claim.

2.The Applicant was born and raised in Hai Phong, Vietnam. After leaving school she never worked and instead indulged in electronic games, and for which she borrowed monies some local money-lender to be repaid by instalments with interests, but in March 2019 when she defaulted with her loan repayments, her creditor started to send men to threaten her, and to avoid such threats the Applicant fled from her home to hide in a friend’s place, and on 26 March 2019 she departed Vietnam for China, and from there she later sneaked into Hong Kong, and upon her arrest by the police she then raised her non‑refoulement claim for protection, for which she completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 27 June 2020 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

3.By a Notice of Decision dated 16 September 2020 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 her 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”).

4.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 her creditor and followers upon her return to Vietnam as low due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that there is no evidence of any real intention of her creditor to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her to repay her debts, that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her and her creditor only 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 Vietnam with a large population of 99 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 330,000 square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied young adult with education to move to other areas of the country away from her home district in large cities such as Ho Chi Minh City where it would be difficult if not impossible for her creditor to locate her.

5.On 28 September 2020 the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, but for which she failed to attend the scheduled oral hearing on 24 February 2021 before the Board without any explanation or response to the Board’s subsequent enquiry about her non-attendance, and that the Board then proceeded to deal with her appeal on paper based on all the materials and information provided by her earlier to the Director and available in the hearing bundle before the Board. On 16 April 2021 her appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

6.In its decision[1] the Board found material inconsistencies and discrepancies in the Applicant’s evidence that it doubted the credibility of her claim of fear of harm from any creditor over any debts that caused her to leave her country to come to Hong Kong to seek protection, that even if her account of events as to threats from her creditor over her outstanding debts were true that there was no reliable evidence of any real intention of her creditor to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her to repay her debts, and that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her and her creditor only without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant upon her return to Vietnam as well as reasonable internal relocation alternatives for her to move safely to other parts of the country away from her home district without any risk of being located by her creditor that her claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.

7.On 6 May 2021 the Applicant filed her Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in her Form or her supporting affirmation of the same date, nor did she request any oral hearing for her application. As such, and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in her 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 her intended challenge of the Board’s decision.

8.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.

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

10.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.

11.For all these reasons I am not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, I therefore refuse to grant leave and accordingly dismiss her application.

Dated the 18^th day of November 2025

(Chung Lai Fan, Christine)
for Registrar, High Court

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

Notes for the Applicant: If leave has been granted, the Applicant or the Applicant’s solicitors must:
a) serve on the respondent and such interested parties as may be directed by the Court the order granting leave and any directions given within 14 days after the leave was granted (Order 53, rule 4A); b) issue the originating summons within 14 days after the grant of leave and serve it in accordance with Order 53, rule 5; and c) supply to every other party copies of every affidavit which the Applicant proposes to use at the hearing, including the affidavit in support of the application for leave (Order 53, rule 6(5)).		Sent to the Applicant on 18 November 2025 Ha Thuy Quynh Applicant’s ref. no.: Nil.		Sent to the Putative Respondent / the Putative Respondent’s solicitors / such Putative Interested Parties as may be directed by the Court / the Putative Interested Parties’ solicitors on 18 November 2025 Torture Claims Appeal Board Putative Respondent’s ref. no.: USM 17241/20/9/60/V2574 Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party’s ref. no.: QA T/C 409/20 (formerly RBCZ 10290/20)(T2I99) Department of Justice, Senior Assistant Law Officer (Civil Law) (Civil Litigation Unit 2)