Upper Tribunal (Immigration and asylum chamber), 2014-08-28, [2014] UKUT 391 (IAC) (GP and others (South Korean citizenship) (CG))
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Judge | Mr C M G Ockelton, Vice President, Upper Tribunal Judge Gleeson |
| Status | Reported |
| Date | 28 August 2014 |
| Published date | 03 September 2014 |
| Court | Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) |
| Hearing Date | 02 July 2014 |
| Subject Matter | South Korean citizenship) (CG |
| Appeal Number | [2014] UKUT 391 (IAC) |
Appeal Numbers: AA/15281/2009
AA/15283/2009
AA/15285/2009
AA/10676/2011
Upper Tribunal
(Immigration and Asylum Chamber)
GP and others (South Korean citizenship) North Korea CG [2014] UKUT 00391 (IAC)
THE IMMIGRATION ACTS
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Heard at Field House |
Sent to parties on: |
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On 8 April and 2 July 2013 |
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Before
Mr C M G Ockelton, Vice President
Upper Tribunal Judge Gleeson
Between
gp
JJ
JP
MP
[ANONYMITY ORDERS MADE]
Appellants
and
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent
Representation:
For Appellants GP, JJ and JP: Miss C Hulse, instructed by Duncan Moghal, solicitors
For Appellant MP: Mr M Karnik, instructed by Jackson & Canter, solicitors
For the Respondent: Mr K Norton, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer
(1) The Upper Tribunal’s country guidance in KK and others (Nationality: North Korea) Korea CG [2011] UKUT 92 (IAC) stands, with the exception of paragraphs 2(d) and 2(e) thereof. Paragraphs (2), (3) and (4) of this guidance replace that given in paragraphs 2(d) and 2(e) respectively of KK.
(2) South Korean law makes limited provision for dual nationality under the Overseas Koreans Act and the Nationality Act (as amended).
(3) All North Korean citizens are also citizens of South Korea. While absence from the Korean Peninsula for more than 10 years may entail fuller enquiries as to whether a person has acquired another nationality or right of residence before a travel document is issued, upon return to South Korea all persons from the Korean Peninsula are treated as returning South Korean citizens.
(4) There is no evidence that North Koreans returned to South Korea are sent back to North Korea or anywhere else, even if they fail the 'protection' procedure, and however long they have been outside the Korean Peninsula.
(5) The process of returning North Koreans to South Korea is now set out in the United Kingdom-South Korea Readmission Agreement (the Readmission Agreement) entered into between the two countries on 10 December 2011. At present, the issue of emergency travel documents under the Readmission Agreement is confined to those for whom documents and/or fingerprint evidence establish that they are already known to South Korea as citizens, or who have registered as such with the South Korean Embassy in the United Kingdom.
(6) Applying MA (Ethiopia) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2009] EWCA Civ 289, North Koreans outside the Korean Peninsula who object to return to South Korea must cooperate with the United Kingdom authorities in seeking to establish whether they can avail themselves of the protection of another country, in particular South Korea. Unless they can demonstrate that in all of the countries where they are entitled to citizenship they have a well-founded fear of persecution for a Refugee Convention reason, they are not refugees.
(7) If they are not refugees, it remains open to such persons to seek to establish individual factors creating a risk for them in South Korea which would engage the United Kingdom’s international obligations under the EU Qualification Directive or the ECHR.
(8) There is no risk of refoulement of any North Korean to North Korea from South Korea, whether directly or via China. South Korea does not return anyone to North Korea at all and it does not return North Koreans to China. In a small number of cases, Chinese nationals have been returned to China. A small number of persons identified by the South Korean authorities as North Korean intelligence agents have been prosecuted in South Korea. There is no evidence that they were subsequently required to leave South Korea.
(9) Once the 'protection' procedure has been completed, North Korean migrants have the same rights as other South Korean citizens save that they are not required to perform military service for South Korea. They have access to resettlement assistance, including housing, training and financial assistance. Former North Koreans may have difficulty in adjusting to South Korea and there may be some discrimination in social integration, employment and housing, but not at a level which requires international protection.
DETERMINATION AND REASONS
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In this appeal, the appellants, who are all citizens of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, whom the respondent considers also to be citizens of the Republic of Korea, appeal against the First-tier Tribunal’s dismissal of their appeals against the respondent’s setting of removal directions to South Korea following her refusal to grant them refugee status, humanitarian protection or leave to remain on human rights grounds. In this decision, we refer to the Republic of Korea as South Korea and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea as North Korea.
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The respondent accepts that if North Korea is the appellants’ only citizenship, they are refugees and cannot be removed from the United Kingdom. She relies on their entitlement to the protection of South Korean citizenship.
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In the case of MP, the respondent’s removal directions were set in the alternative to either North Korea or South Korea. The respondent accepted at the hearing that none of the appellants can be returned to North Korea and it is clear from the refusal letter accompanying her removal directions that she did not then intend removal to North Korea. We approach these appeals on the basis that the only country to which removal is contemplated, for all of the appellants, is South Korea.
The appellants
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The appellants in these proceedings all entered the United Kingdom unlawfully from China and have been here for less than 10 years. The husband and wife in the GP family arrived together on 11 November 2007, and have had two children while in the United Kingdom. The citizenship of those children is determined by that of their parents: they are not British citizens. MP, an unmarried man, arrived on 21 October 2008.
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All the appellants challenge decisions by the respondent to set removal directions to South Korea on the basis that they are citizens of that country. None of them has approached the South Korean authorities in the United Kingdom in order to establish whether they would in fact be admitted to South Korea, or whether South Korea recognises them as its citizens. However, the respondent has established that MP’s fingerprints are on the South Korean database.
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The first three appellants are members of the same family and are referred to in this decision as ‘GP’ or ‘the GP family’ unless the context requires consideration of the individual members of that family; the fourth appellant, MP, has no dependants. They all originally came from North Korea and assert that they have not lived in South Korea. The material facts in each appeal are as follows:
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GP and JP grew up in North Korea and their North Korean origin is not disputed. They left North Korea for China together for the first time in 2004, but were unable to find work in China: they returned to North Korea after less than a month. They were arrested on return, and were both detained and beaten by the North Korean authorities. When the husband developed diarrhoea and ‘bad lungs’, they were released from detention and given a show trial, which caused them to be shunned and abused in public. They then left North Korea for a second time, again via the Tuman River: the husband had been diagnosed with spinal tuberculosis. Their journey to the United Kingdom was paid for by their church pastor, in return for free work done for him by the husband. GP and JP entered the United Kingdom on false passports in November 2007. They now have two children, the third appellant who was born in the United Kingdom in 2008, and a younger daughter, born in 2010. The respondent proposes to remove the GP family to South Korea. She has never suggested that she would remove them to North Korea, where she accepts that they would be at risk of persecution or serious harm, or to China, where there is a risk of refoulement.
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MP left North Korea illegally to go to China, in 2006, travelling with his mother, who now lives in South Korea. MP came to the United Kingdom in 2008, travelling with a South Korean pastor on a false South Korean passport. It is the respondent’s case that MP is already a citizen of South Korea and that he is not at risk of persecution or serious harm if returned there. His fingerprints have been found on the South Korean database and his account of having given them at Shenyang South Korean Consulate in China in 2006 as part of an unsuccessful attempt to apply for a South Korean visa there was rejected by the respondent.
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