FIRST SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 51666/13
H
against Norway
The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 17 February 2015 as a Committee composed of:
Khanlar Hajiyev, President,
Erik Møse,
Dmitry Dedov, judges,
and André Wampach, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 2 April 2013,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
FACTS AND PROCEDURE
1. The applicant, Ms H, is an Ethiopian national, who was born in 1984 and lives in Norway. The President granted the applicant’s request for her identity not to be disclosed to the public (Rule 47 § 4). She was represented before the Court by the Aire Centre in London (Mr A. Weiss) and by the Norwegian law firm Endresen, Brygfjeld and Torrall.
2. The Norwegian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agents, Mr Marius Emberland and Mr Christian Reusch.
3. The applicant in the present application was among a group of 354 Ethiopian nationals who lodged an application to the Court on 2 April 2013. On 4 April 2013 their request under Rule 39 to stop their deportation to Ethiopia was rejected by the Acting President of the Section to which the case had been allocated.
4. Application no. 22343/13, concerning 343 of the above-mentioned applicants, was declared inadmissible on 10 December 2013 by a Committee. The cases concerning the remaining eleven applicants were registered under separate application numbers and their complaints under Article 3 of the Convention were communicated to the Norwegian Government for observations on the admissibility and merits. Ten of those were declared inadmissible by a Committee on 7 October 2014 (B and 9 others v. Norway, appl. nos. 48932/13, 48940/13, 48950/13, 50005/13, 51184/13, 51192/13, 51219/13, 51480/13, 51652/13 and 61156/13). The present application is the only remaining application.
COMPLAINTS
5. The applicant, as the other abovementioned applicants had done, complained under Article 3 of the Convention that she would be at risk of ill-treatment upon return to Ethiopia, that she would be subjected to collective expulsion to Ethiopia in violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4, and, since no remedy with automatic suspensive effect against the proposed collective expulsion was available under domestic law, there had also been a breach of Article 13, in conjunction with the above‑mentioned provisions. She also invoked Article 8 but submitted no statement of the factual basis or of the legal arguments for her allegations of a violation of that provision.
THE LAW
6. The Government informed the Court that the Immigration Appeals Board (Utlendingsnemnda – UNE), by its decision of 30 May 2014, had granted the applicant a one-year renewable residence permit on the basis of family reunification with her daughter who had been granted a residence permit in Norway. The Board noted in its decision that since the applicant had failed to substantiate her identity she was only granted a temporary permit. However, if she would substantiate her identity she could be granted a permanent residence permit.
7. The applicant’s representative was requested to inform the Court whether she wished to maintain her application in light of the fact that she had been granted a residence permit in Norway. By a letter of 16 September 2014, the representative stated that she intended to maintain her application. He argued that the matter had not been resolved and that it was therefore inappropriate to strike out the application in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (b) of the Convention. He referred to the case-law of the Court, in particular Ahmed v. Austria, 17 December 1996, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1996‑VI, and submitted that a short-term residence permit, particularly when granted on a discretionary basis, was not sufficient to resolve a complaint that expulsion would violate Article 3 of the Convention. He further submitted that respect for human rights required the Court to continue its examination of the matter (Article 37 § 1 in fine) and referred in particular to her complaint under Article 13.
8. However, the applicant in Ahmed v. Austria (cited above) had been granted a refugee status in Austria which was revoked on the ground of his criminal behaviour. Contrary to what is suggested above, he had not been granted a permit to reside in Austria but only a stay of the execution of the decision to deport him as he could not be returned to Somalia without being exposed to a risk of treatment contrary to Article 3. The Court notes that the applicant in the present case no longer risks being expelled to Ethiopia as she has been granted a residence permit for one year, renewable, and thus will be able to remain in Norway. Consequently, she no longer faces any real and imminent risk of removal to Ethiopia (see, for instance, A.G. v. Sweden (dec.), no. 22107/08, 6 December 2011). The applicant’s initial complaint to the Court was essentially that she feared that her deportation to Ethiopia would expose her to ill-treatment contrary to Article 3. That threat of a potential violation has however been removed by virtue of the decision of 30 May 2014 granting her a renewable residence in Norway (see, for instance, Paez v. Sweden, 30 October 1997, § 29, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1997‑VII). The Court also notes that it is in the hands of the applicant to provide the necessary information to the Norwegian immigration authorities in order to obtain a permanent residence permit. In any event, should her legal situation in Norway change and a risk of expulsion become imminent, it remains open to her to lodge a new application with the Court (see M.A. v. Sweden (dec.), no. 28361/12, 19 November 2013), including a request for an interim measure under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court should she wish to do so.
9. In the above circumstances, the Court finds that the matter under Article 3 must be considered to have been resolved, within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 (b) of the Convention. Moreover, in accordance with Article 37 § 1 in fine, the Court finds no special circumstances regarding respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols which require the continued examination of the complaint.
10. Accordingly, it is appropriate to strike the complaint under Article 3 out.
11. As to the remaining complaints, which were not communicated, the Court finds no reason to distinguish them from the similar complaints raised in the ten applications declared inadmissible on 7 October 2014 (see paragraph 4 above) on the ground that the admissibility criteria set out in Articles 34 and 35 of the Convention had not been met. Accordingly, the remainder of the present application must be declared inadmissible under these provisions.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Decides to strike out the complaint under Article 3 of the Convention;
Declares the remainder of the complaints inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 12 March 2015.
André WampachKhanlar Hajiyev
Deputy RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy