ZB and AK (Kurds, Article 3, Risk, IFA) Syria

These appeals were listed before the Tribunal with the intention that they should give general country guidance on the position of ethnic Kurds of Syrian nationality, but at the commencement of the hearing, Mr Morris indicated for the Secretary of State that he would not seek to contest either appeal further and that the Secretary of State accepted that in the case of each claimant he was entitled to succeed both in his asylum claim under the Refugee Convention 1951 and in his claim that return would be in breach of his human rights under Article 3 of the European Convention of 1950.

It is appropriate that we should also record at this point that in the case of B the Adjudicator had dismissed his asylum appeal but had allowed his Article 3 claim on the basis of risk upon return. The Secretary of State had sought and been granted permission to appeal against the allowing of his appeal on Article 3 grounds, and shortly thereafter permission had also been given to B on his application for permission to challenge the dismissal of the asylum claim by the Adjudicator, so that there was a cross appeal in the case of B.

The Secretary of State had filed in evidence the United States Department of State Country Report on Human Rights Practices for 2003 in relation to Syria, which had been published on 25 February 2004, together with the Amnesty International Report on Syria for 2003, covering the period to December 2002, with a note from the Canadian section of Amnesty International of December 2002 dealing with the concerns of Amnesty International regarding risk on return to Syria.

The State Department Report summarised the Syrian Government's human rights record in the following terms:

That general summary is, of course, examined in more detail in the remainder of the document and it is clear that Kurdish ethnicity may be an exacerbating factor for those who come to the adverse attention of the State Authorities.