Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 177
August-September 2014
W.H. v. Sweden (referral) - 49341/10
Judgment 27.3.2014 [Section V]
Article 3
Expulsion
Order for deportation of a Mandaean woman to Iraq: case referred to the Grand Chamber
The applicant, who was born in Baghdad and is of Mandaean denomination, applied for asylum after arriving in Sweden in August 2007. She explained that, as the smallest and most vulnerable minority in Iraq, Mandaeans were subjected to extortion, kidnappings and murder and Mandaean women and children were forced to convert to Islam, often after being assaulted and raped. They were not a large enough community to be able to protect and support each other and there was no particular region where they could settle safely. The applicant, who was divorced, feared that she would be forcibly remarried. Her situation had been further aggravated by the fact that she is a single woman without a social network in Iraq. Furthermore, in Sweden she had met a Muslim man with whom she had formed a relationship, a situation that would never be accepted in Iraq. In December 2009 the Migration Court upheld a decision of the Migration Board rejecting her application for asylum after finding that the threat concerning forced marriage was primarily related to the general security situation in Iraq which had since improved.
In a judgment of 27 March 2014, a Chamber of the Court held unanimously that the implementation of the deportation order against the applicant would not give rise to a violation of Article 3 of the Convention, provided that she was not returned to parts of Iraq situated outside the Kurdistan Region. It found that, although, as a Mandaean single woman, she may face a real risk of being subjected to treatment contrary to Article 3 if she was returned to the southern and central parts of Iraq, she could reasonably relocate to the Kurdistan Region, where she would not face such a risk. Neither the general situation in that region nor any of her personal circumstances indicated the existence of such a risk.
The indication made under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court requiring the Government not to deport the applicant pending the final outcome of the proceedings before the Court remains in force.
On 8 September 2014 the case was referred to the Grand Chamber at the applicant’s request.
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
Click here for the Case-Law Information Notes
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy