Case Document

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HCAL 651/2024

[2026] HKCFI 5604

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 651 OF 2024

BETWEEN

	Silfiya Pungki Pratiwi	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:

The application for leave to apply for Judicial Review be dismissed.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.The Applicant is a 30-year-old national of Indonesia who last arrived in Hong Kong on 9 July 2018 with permission to continue to work as a foreign domestic helper until the expiration of her employment contract or within 14 days of its early termination, but when her last employment was prematurely terminated on 8 May 2022, she did not depart and instead overstayed, and more than one year later on 22 August 2023 she surrendered to the Immigration Department and raised a non-refoulement claim for protection on the basis that if she returned to Indonesia she would be harmed or killed by her former husband over their monetary dispute.

2.The Applicant was born and raised in Malang, Jawa Timur, Indonesia. After leaving school she married her husband, but as he was just an odd-job worker with limited income and often in debt, the Applicant in 2015 went to Surabaya to work as a domestic helper to help support their family.

3.In 2017 the Applicant started coming to Hong Kong to work as a foreign domestic helper and to continue to remit money to her husband in Indonesia to assist him with his loan repayments.

4.However, later in 2021 she discovered that he was having an affair with another woman while she was away working, and so she ceased all her payments to him and subsequently through her lawyer obtained a divorce from him, whereupon her husband became furious and made threatening calls threatening to kill her upon her return.

5.As a result, the Applicant became fearful for her life, and so after her last employment was prematurely terminated in May 2022, she was afraid to return to Indonesia and therefore overstayed in Hong Kong, and upon surrendering to the Immigration Department in August 2023, she then raised her non-refoulement claim for protection, for which she completed a Non‑refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 25 October 2023 and attended a screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

6.By a Notice of Decision dated 16 November 2023, 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 the 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”).

7.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 her former husband upon her return to Indonesia as low due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from him, that there is no evidence of any real intention of her former husband to seriously harm or kill her other than just angry words and empty threats for her to pay him money for his use, that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between the 2 of them 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”) shows that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Indonesia with a large population of 279 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 1.9 million square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied young adult with working experience to move to other areas of the country away from her home district in large cities such as Jakarta or Bali where it would be difficult if not impossible for her former husband to locate her.

8.On 28 November 2023 the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which she attended an oral hearing on 5 February 2024 before the Board during which she gave evidence and answered questions raised about her claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 6 February 2024 her appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

9.In its decision[1] the Board found no reliable evidence of any real intention of her former husband to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her for money with just angry words and empty threats, and that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between the 2 of them only without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant upon her return to Indonesia if resorted to 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 former husband that her claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.

10.On 24 April 2024 the Applicant filed her Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, and in her supporting affirmation of the same date she put forward the following grounds for her intended challenge:

(1)  That the Adjudicator did not consider her claim at all and just directly dismissed it without taking any time to think about her life;

(2)  That the Adjudicator unreasonably refused to allow her to submit her supporting documents without translations and also failed to give her time to arrange for their translations;

(3)  That the interpreter was impatient and unhelpful to her during her appeal hearing before the Board.

11.These are however just some bare and bald assertions of the Applicant without any relevant or necessary details or particulars or elaborations as to how they apply to her case or how the Board or the Adjudicator had erred in the decision, or in what way the decision was unfair or unreasonable or that the Adjudicator had acted procedurally unfairly or irrational, or what documents the Adjudicator had refused to allow her to submit without translations when the record shows no such issue ever raised by her to the Board, or in what way the interpreter was impatient or unhelpful to her during her appeal hearing before the Board. As such, and as none of these assertions were properly elaborated or presented with any relevant particulars or specifics by the Applicant, I do not find any of them reasonably arguable for her intended challenge.

12.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 her 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.

13.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 if real is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for her to relocate to other parts of Indonesia, there is simply no justification to afford her with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.

14.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.

15.Moreover, the Applicant has recently on 25 August 2026 in writing requested to withdraw her application as her issues in her home country have been resolved and she now wants to return to Indonesia as soon as possible.

16.In the premises, as I am for the given reasons not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and in view of her latest confirmation of no more issue for her to return to her home country, I accordingly dismiss her leave application.

Dated the 8^th day of October 2026

(Joyce Ooi)
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 his 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 8 October 2026 Silfiya Pungki Pratiwi 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 8 October 2026 Torture Claims Appeal Board Putative Respondent’s ref. no.: USM 22528 Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party’s ref. no.: QA T/C 1156/23 (formerly RBCZ 5001197/23) Department of Justice, Senior Assistant Law Officer (Civil Law) (Civil Litigation Unit 2)