• Advice & Representation
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Advice & Representation

After escaping to another country to seek protection from persecution, the most critical challenge facing refugees is the determination of their status as refugees. Depending on which country they end up in, this status is determined by the Refugee Status Determination (RSD) procedure established either by the government of that country or by the local office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). If refugees are denied this status by either decision-maker they will likely be deported to their country of origin.

The RSD process is complex and requires decision-makers to have a correct knowledge of relevant legal principles as well as the ability to assess appropriately the merits of the case, which often contains unfamiliar and complicated factual situations about a foreign country. While each case has its own peculiarities and needs to be fully and adequately presented to the examining authority, very few refugee claimants have any familiarity with the requirements of RSD systems. Many are unable to function in the foreign language of the country where they claim asylum.

A competent legal advisor is therefore essential to ensure that the refugee claimant explains the facts of his or her claim clearly and comprehensively and to provide the needed legal arguments to show that s/he meets the legal criteria for refugee status. Understanding the claimant's culture and direct communication in his or her mother tongue makes the process considerably more accurate and productive.

Many Iranians who flee to seek protection in other countries end up in western countries where RSD is done by governments and where they have access to low cost or free legal advice and representation. However, the advice and representation they receive is not always sufficient or helpful and sometimes even do more harm to their cases than no assistance at all.

IRA-INC assists Iranian refugee applicants in western countries by making referrals to experienced lawyers for representation of cases, submitting written comments on the substance of refugee claims to refugee decision-making bodies and critiques of decisions already made on claims by refugee decision-making bodies before review bodies. IRA-INC also works with refugee applicants and/or their lawyers to better establish and argue the substance of claims, and provides translation and interpretation and documentation to support the substance of claims.

Many also end up in countries like Turkey, Iraq, Pakistan, and Malaysia where RSD is conducted by UNHCR and where legal assistance is not available at all or is scarce. As a neighbor of Iran, Turkey has been a major country of first asylum for Iranians. Over the past decade, after the United Kingdom, Turkey has been the second most important destination country for Iranian asylum seekers, with an average of 2,650 applications per year. IRA-INC assists Iranian asylum seekers and refugees in Turkey with their UNHCR refugee cases by providing individual or group counseling via telephone, assistance in preparation of statements and appeal letters, translation, documentation, and also by representing vulnerable applicants on appeal with written submissions.

IRA-INC has pioneered international litigation under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) against the government of Turkey to challenge deportation, detention and detention conditions of refugees.

From 1998-2006 IRA-INC focused on refugees whose cases had been unfairly rejected by the UNHCR and successfully prevented the deportation of 23 refugees (six cases) by lodging complaints on their behalf with the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). In five cases UNHCR reversed its decisions during the ECtHR's proceedings. In one case (D. et al (24245/03)) the negative decision was reversed after the ECtHR overruled UNHCR's decision. This was the first and only time that an international tribunal had scrutinized and condemned a faulty decision by UNHCR that had resulted in an unlawful deportation order for the applicants.

In 2009/10, IRA-INC won six new cases against the Turkish government on behalf of seven UNHCR-recognized refugees. These include the precedent-setting case of Abdolkhani and Karimnia v. Turkey I (30471/08) in which the ECtHR issued a sweeping pronouncement that applicants' unlawful detention and deportation by the Turkish government violated Articles 3, 13, 5-1, 5-2 and 5-4 of the Convention. These cases challenged the legality of applicants' impending deportation, their detention and the unsatisfactory material conditions under which they had been detained .

In 2010/11 IRA-INC filed two cases before the ECtHR against the government of Sweden. The seven applicants represented in these cases were facing deportation following rejection of their refugee application(s). At the last stage of long proceedings, the Swedish Migration Board granted refugee status to all seven applicants.