AHMED MANZOOR v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD

HCAL 1634/2021

[2025] HKCFI 6175

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 1634 OF 2021

Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review

NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord 53 r 3)

Following:

	consideration of the documents only;            or
	consideration of the documents and oral submissions by the Applicant in open court / the Applicant being absent in open court;

The application for leave to apply for judicial review be dismissed.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.  The Applicant is a 51-year-old national of Pakistan who had previously entered Hong Kong illegally in 2007 but was arrested by police and subsequently repatriated to Pakistan again tried to enter Hong Kong on 12 August 2011, and when he was refused entry by the Immigration Department, he raised a torture claim on the basis that if returned to Pakistan he would be harmed or killed by the family of a traffic accident victim who blamed him for causing the accident, and after it was rejected, he then sought non-refoulement protection on the same basis. He was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim.

2.  The Applicant was born and raised in Baig Pur, Tehsil District – Jhelum, Punjab, Pakistan. After leaving school he worked in a dairy farm to make his living, got married and raised a family with 4 children in his home district.

3.  The Applicant did not have any driving license but often drove his motorcycle within his home village, and on one occasion in April 2011 his motorcycle collided with another villager also on a motorcycle that the villager subsequently died from his injuries in the hospital, and for which his family blamed the Applicant and threatened to kill him in revenge by firing gun shots at him on one occasion but missed, and so the Applicant fled from his home village for Sialkot to hide in a friend’s place.

4.  In August 2011, he departed Pakistan for China, and from there he tried to enter Hong Kong, but when he was refused entry by the Immigration Department he raised his torture claim, and after it was rejected he then sought non-refoulement protection, for which he completed a Supplementary Claim Form (“SCF”) on 19 September 2018 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

5.  By a Notice of Decision dated 31 December 2018, the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the remaining applicable grounds other than torture risk including risk of his absolute or non-derogable rights under the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap 383 (“HKBOR”) being violated including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of HKBOR (“BOR 3 Risk”), and risk of persecution with reference to the non-refoulement principle under Article 33 of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (“Persecution Risk”).

6.  In his decision, the Director took into account of all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and assessed the level of risk of harm from the traffic accident victim’s family upon his return to Pakistan as low due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that there is no evidence of any real intention of them to seriously harm or kill him other than angry words and empty threats, that in any event it was a private and personal dispute between them only without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant if resorted to, and that reliable and objective Country of Origin Information (“COI”) show that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Pakistan with a large population of 205 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 796,000 square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied adult with working experience to move to other areas of the country away from his home district in large cities such as Islamabad where it would be difficult if not impossible for anyone to locate him.

7.  On 16 January 2019, the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which he attended an oral hearing on 20 September 2021 before the Board during which he gave evidence and answered questions raised of his claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 7 October 2021 his appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

8.  In its decision[1], the Board found material inconsistencies discrepancies and contradictions in the Applicant’s evidence that it doubted and rejected the credibility of his claim of fear of harm from the family of any traffic accident victim that caused him to leave his country to come to Hong Kong to seek protection that it is not accepted that he had been involved in any traffic accident as alleged or that he had faced any threats from any victim from such accident that there were no substantial grounds for concluding that there is any real risk that the Applicant would suffer from any proscribed harm upon his return to Pakistan that his claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.

9.  On 2 December 2021 the Applicant filed his Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, and after repeating his claim as before he put forward the following grounds for his intended challenge:

(1)  That the Board reached the decision wrongly in assessing his non-refoulement claim as the decision was not fair or reasonable as required by the Wednesbury test in failing to recognize that his life must be protected by the criminal law from the killings that he may face if deported back to his home country;

(2)  That the Board failed to appreciate or place proper or sufficient weight or importance to the presence of State Acquiescence in his case which led to an unfair outcome of rejecting his claim without realizing that he was tortured at the behest of the state law enforcement agencies and politicians that the state would be rendered liable to the Applicant by cause of the state and its public officials failing to provide reasonable protection for its citizens under the duty of due diligence;

(3)  That the Adjudicator acted unreasonable and was procedurally unfair by placing too much reliance on COI but failed to take into account the Applicant’s personal background and experience in assessing his claim;

(4)  That the Board had listed relevant COI which supported the Applicant’s aversions that the police in her country would not be able to protect but failed to consider or give sufficient weight to such evidence and instead ruled otherwise against the Applicant’s case which was a clear case of unfair attitude shown by the Board which in itself is enough to render its decision void;

(5)  That the Board failed to attain the high standard of fairness required by the Wednesbury test in failing to take into account the Applicant’s argument that corruption and incompetency of the administration in the Applicant’s country is still a very serious problem as various human rights organizations had compiled reports that stated testament to the Applicant’s assertions;

(6)  That the Adjudicator was procedurally improper and unfair when assessing whether or not to accept the Applicant’s explanations and unreasonably required him to respond to questions that he was not in a position to offer any response;

(7)  That the Adjudicator failed to take into account the nexus of political parties and official corruption which exist in the Applicant’s country making the persecution of the Applicant effectively persecution by the State;

(8)  That the Adjudicator made a ruling to dismiss the Applicant’s appeal based on findings which the Adjudicator ought to allow and thus the decision was irrational.

10.  These are however all just bare and vague assertions of the Applicant containing a few key words or phrases but without any necessary or relevant particulars or specifics or elaborations as to how they apply to his case or how the Board or the Adjudicator had erred in the decision, or in what way was the decision unfair or unreasonable or that the Adjudicator had acted procedurally unfair or irrational, or how did the Adjudicator fail to take into account of relevant COI or being selective or improperly rely on irrelevant COI, or what relevancy was state acquiescence to the Applicant’s case or what evidence is there to suggest that the Applicant has ever been tortured by state law enforcement agencies or politicians when on the factual basis of his own case that it was a private dispute between him and the family of a traffic victim only without any official involvement or political element at all. As such, and as none of these assertions were properly elaborated or presented with any relevant particulars or specifics by the Applicant, I do not find any of them reasonably arguable for his intended challenge.

11.  As has been repeatedly emphasized by the Court of Appeal, judicial review does not operate as a rehearing of a non-refoulement claim when the proper occasion for the Applicant to present and articulate his claim is in the screening process and interview before the Immigration Department and in the process before the Board where the evaluation of the risk of harm is primarily a matter for the Director and the Board as they are entitled to make such evaluation based on the evidence available to them that the court will not usurp their role as primary decision makers in the absence of any legal error or procedural unfairness or irrationality in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, as judicial review is not an avenue for revisiting the assessment by them in the hope that the court may consider the matter afresh: Re Lakhwinder Singh [2018] HKCA 246; Re Daljit Singh [2018] HKCA 328; Re Mudannayakalage Chaminda Pushpa Kumara [2018] HKCA 400; and Nupur Mst v Director of Immigration [2018] HKCA 524.

12.  In the Applicant’s case, the Board rejected his claim essentially on its adverse finding on his credibility for the thorough and detailed analysis and reasoning set out in its decision with the benefit of hearing him in his oral evidence and his answers to questions raised of his claim, and in the absence of any error of law or procedural unfairness in his process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis to challenge the finding of the Board.

13.  Furthermore, the fact is that it has also been established by the Director in his decision that the risk of harm in the Applicant’s claim even if real is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for him to relocate to other part of Pakistan, a decision also agreed and confirmed by the Board, there is simply no justification to afford him with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.

14.  Having considered the decisions of both the Director and the Board with rigorous examination and anxious scrutiny, I do not find any error of law or procedural unfairness in either of them, nor any failure on their part to apply high standards of fairness in their consideration and assessment of the Applicant’s claim.

15.  Moreover, the Applicant recently on 21 October 2025 in writing requested to withdraw his application as his issues in his home country have been resolved that he now wants to return to Pakistan.

16.  In the premises, as I am for the given reasons not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and in view of his latest confirmation of no more issue for him to return to his home country, I accordingly dismiss his leave application.

Where leave to apply has been granted, Applicants and their legal advisers are reminded of their obligation to reconsider the merits of their application in the light of the Respondent’s evidence

Form CALL-1