ARUNNO NISA alias ARUNNO CHADANIS v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD

HCAL 1140/2023

[2026] HKCFI 648

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 1140 OF 2023

Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review
NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord 53 r 3)

Following:

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 Thailand who arrived in Hong Kong on 10 January 2020 as a visitor with permission to remain as such up to 9 February 2020 when she did not depart and instead overstayed, and was arrested by police more than 1 year later on 14 July 2021. After she was referred to the Immigration Department for investigation, she raised a non-refoulement claim for protection on the basis that if she returned to Thailand she would be harmed or killed by her creditors for failing to repay her debts.  

2.  The Applicant was born and raised in Bong Tai Sub-district, Sawang Daen Din, Sakon Nakhon Province, Thailand before moving to Bangkok in 1995 where she worked in a supermarket, married her husband and raised a family with 3 children.

3.  In 2017 she divorced her husband and moved with her children to stay with her mother in Nadoon, Maha Sarakham where she worked as a farmer to make her living and to support her children.

4.  However, due to her limited income, she had had to resort to borrowing loans from some local money-lenders, but by 2018 when she defaulted with her loan repayments, her creditors sent men to threaten her, and after being beaten by those men on several occasions, she became fearful for her safety and so on 10 January 2020 she departed Thailand for Hong Kong and subsequently overstayed, and upon her arrest by the police she then raised her non-refoulement claim for protection, for which she completed a Non‑refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 3 December 2021 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).             

5.  By a Notice of Decision dated 25 February 2022 the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the applicable grounds including risk of torture under Part VIIC of the Immigration Ordinance, Cap 115 (“Torture Risk”), risk of her 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 found no substantial grounds for believing that there will be any real risk of her being harmed or killed by her creditors upon her return to Thailand due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that there is no evidence of any real intention of her creditors to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her to repay her debts, that in any event these were private monetary disputes between her and her creditors 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 Thailand with a large population of 69 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 500,000 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 her home district in large cities such as Chiang Mai where it would be difficult if not impossible for her creditors to locate her.

7.  On 3 March 2022 the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which she attended an oral hearing on 13 February 2023 before the Board during which she gave evidence and answered questions raised of her claim by the Adjudicator for the Board.  On 5 July 2023 her appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

8.  In its decision[1] the Board accepted the Applicant’s claim of fear of harm from her creditors over her unpaid debts but found no reliable evidence of any real intention of her creditors to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her to repay her debts, and that in any event these were private monetary disputes between them only without any official involvement that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available to her upon her return to Thailand to move safely to other parts of the country away from her home district without any risk of being located by her creditors that her claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.    

9.  On 10 July 2023 the Applicant filed her Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in her Form or her supporting affirmation of the same date to which she just attached a copy of the decision but without putting forth any proper ground for her intended challenge. As such, and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in her process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for her intended challenge of the Board’s decision.

10.  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 her 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.  

11.  In the Applicant’s case, the fact is that it has been correctly established by both the Director and the Board in their respective decisions that the risk of harm in her claim if real is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for her to relocate to other part of Thailand, there is simply no justification to afford her with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.                

12.  In the premises, and 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.

13.  It is also of note that the Applicant recently on 8 December 2025 in writing requested to withdraw her application as she now wants to return to Thailand but without providing any explanation as to the situation of her claimed risk in her home country.

14.  For all these reasons I am not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, I therefore refuse to grant leave and accordingly dismiss her 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