FIFTH SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 6553/25
Hashim Abdi ABDULE
against Denmark
The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting on 3 July 2025 as a Committee composed of:
Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström, President,
María Elósegui,
Gilberto Felici, judges,
and Sophie Piquet, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the application (no. 6553/25) against the Kingdom of Denmark lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 20 February 2025 by a Somali national, Mr Hashim Abdi Abdule, who was born in 1997 and lives in Nyborg (“the applicant”) and was represented by Mr Khawaja, a lawyer practising in Copenhagen;
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
1. The applicant entered Denmark at the age of seven. By a final Supreme Court judgment of 5 November 2024, he was convicted of attempted robbery and assault, sentenced to one year’s imprisonment and expelled from Denmark with a six-year re-entry ban.
2. The applicant complained that the order expelling him from Denmark had been in violation of Article 8 of the Convention.
THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT
3. The Court notes that the general principles applicable to cases involving the expulsion of settled immigrants are well established in the Court’s case‑law (see, notably, Üner v. the Netherlands [GC], no. 46410/99, §§ 54‑60, ECHR 2006-XII, and Maslov v. Austria [GC], no. 1638/03, §§ 68‑76, ECHR 2008).
4. The Court also notes the recent cases against Denmark concerning the expulsion of settled immigrants (see, among others, Sharafane v. Denmark, no. 5199/23, 12 November 2024; Al-Habeeb v. Denmark, no. 14171/23, 12 November 2024; Savuran v. Denmark, no. 3645/23, 12 November 2024; Winther v. Denmark, no. 9588/21, 12 November 2024; Noorzae v. Denmark, no. 44810/20, 5 September 2023; Sharifi v. Denmark, no. 31434/21, 5 September 2023; Al‑Masudi v. Denmark, no. 35740/21, 5 September 2023; Avci v. Denmark, no. 40240/19, 30 November 2021; and Abdi v. Denmark, no. 41643/19, 14 September 2021).
5. The Court considers it established that there was an interference with the applicant’s right to respect for his private life within the meaning of Article 8 and that the expulsion order and the re-entry ban were “in accordance with the law” and pursued the legitimate aim of preventing disorder and crime (see also, for example, Salem v. Denmark, no. 77036/11, § 61, 1 December 2016).
6. As to the question of whether the interference was “necessary in a democratic society”, the Court recognises that the domestic courts thoroughly examined each relevant criterion set out, for example, in Maslov (cited above, §§ 72-73) and were fully aware that very serious reasons were required to justify the expulsion of the applicant, a settled migrant who had entered Denmark at the age of seven and who had lawfully spent his childhood and youth in the host country (ibid., § 75).
7. As regards the applicant’s right to respect for his private life, the domestic courts took the relevant factors into account, which included the nature and seriousness of the offence committed by the applicant; the length of the applicant’s stay in the country from which he was going to be expelled; the nationalities of the various persons concerned; and the solidity of his social, cultural and family ties with the host country and with the country of destination. Thus, the Danish courts took into account, among other things, that the applicant was 27 years old, that he had been staying lawfully in the country since the age of 7, and that he had been sentenced to one year’s imprisonment for robbery, committed with a knife against a taxi driver, and for violence, committed as an adult. They also noted that the applicant had a criminal past, which included a conviction for robbery, committed when he had been 17 years old, for which he had been sentenced to one year and three months’ imprisonment and issued with a suspended expulsion order. In addition, in the period from 2014 to 2024 he had been convicted of more than thirty offences, including for violence and possession of a knife in a public place. Furthermore, subsequent to the offences giving rise to the expulsion order in the present case, he had been convicted three times, most recently on 17 June 2024, inter alia for possession of a knife on two separate occasions.
8. The expulsion order was issued together with a six-year re-entry ban. The applicant maintained that the expulsion order had been de facto permanent because the prospect of his re-entering Denmark had been purely theoretical.
9. The Court reiterates that in the Danish context, if by virtue of section 32(5)(i) of the Aliens Act, in the proportionality test, the domestic courts reduce the length of a re-entry ban, since otherwise the length would “for certain” be considered in breach of Denmark’s international obligations, including Article 8 of the Convention, the Court considers that the time-limited nature of the re-entry ban can only be considered a factor capable of rendering the applicant’s expulsion compatible with Article 8 if the expelled person has some prospect of one day returning at least for a visit (see Winther, cited above, § 48).
10. In the present case, however, the length of the re-entry ban was set to six years owing to the rather limited length of the sentence, by virtue of section 32(4)(iv) of the Aliens Act. Section 32(5)(i) of the Aliens Act was not applied. Thus, although it was a factor in the proportionality assessment there is no indication that the length of the re-entry ban was even given significant weight by the Supreme Court in reaching the conclusion that expelling the applicant was compatible with Article 8. On the contrary in its reasoning the Supreme Court gave particular weight to the nature and seriousness of the crime committed, the applicant’s criminal past, and the fact that he had consistently demonstrated a lack of will to comply with Danish law (see also Munir Johana v. Denmark, no. 56803/18, § 58, 12 January 2021).
11. Taking account of all the factors described above, the Court concludes that the interference with the applicant’s private life was supported by relevant and sufficient reasons. It is satisfied that “very serious reasons” were adequately adduced by the national authorities when assessing his case. It notes that at all levels of jurisdiction there was an explicit and thorough assessment of whether the expulsion order could be considered to be contrary to Denmark’s international obligations. The Court points out in this connection that where independent and impartial domestic courts have carefully examined the facts, applying the relevant human rights standards consistently with the Convention and its case-law, and adequately weighed up the applicant’s personal interests against the more general public interest in the case, it is not for the Court to substitute its own assessment of the merits (including, in particular, its own assessment of the factual details of proportionality) for that of the competent national authorities. The only exception to this is where there are shown to be strong reasons for doing so (Savran v. Denmark [GC], no. 57467/15, § 189, 7 December 2021). In the Court’s opinion, such strong reasons are absent in the present case.
12. It follows that the application must be rejected in accordance with Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 4 September 2025.
Sophie Piquet Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström
Acting Deputy Registrar President