VU THI HIEN v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD [Decision on Leave Application]

HCAL 986/2021 [2025] HKCFI 168 IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 986 OF 2021 BETWEEN Vu Thi Hien Applicant and Torture Claims Appeal Board and Putative Respondent Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party 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; Order by Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan: The application for leave to apply for judicial review be dismissed. Observations for the Applicant: The Applicant is a 60-year-old national of Vietnam who entered Hong Kong illegally in September 2019 and was arrested on 2 December 2019 for which she was subsequently convicted and sentenced to prison for 15 months, during which she raised a non-refoulement claim for protection to the Immigration Department on the basis that if she returned to Vietnam she would be harmed or killed by her creditor over her unpaid debts. The Applicant was born and raised in Hai Phong City, Vietnam. After leaving school she worked in the factory, married her husband and raised a family with 2 children in her home district. As both of her children were born with various medical issues which required constant medical expenses that the Applicant and her husband had to meet by borrowing various loans from the same local money-lender, and for which they would repay by instalments. However, in 2018 due to insufficient income the Applicant and her husband started to fall behind with their repayments, and in early 2019 their creditor started to send men to threaten and beat them, and after one particularly violent occasion in March 2019 when her husband was beaten so severely that he subsequently died from his injuries in hospital, while their house was also burnt down by those men that the Applicant thereafter had to take shelter in a relative’s place. As the threats from her creditor had persisted, the Applicant one day in September 2019 departed Vietnam for China, and from there she later sneaked into Hong Kong, and upon her arrest she then raised her non-refoulement claim for protection, for which she completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 24 August 2020 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”). By a Notice of Decision dated 19 October 2020 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”). 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 her creditor and followers upon her return to Vietnam 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 her other than to press her to repay her debts, that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her and her creditor 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 Vietnam with a large population of 98 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 330,000 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 Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City where it would be difficult if not impossible for her creditor to locate her. On 30 October 2020, 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 25 February 2021 before the Board during which she gave evidence and answered questions raised of her claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 24 June 2021, her appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision. In its decision the Board found material inconsistencies and discrepancies in the Applicant’s evidence that it doubted the credibility of her claim of fear of harm from her creditor that caused her to leave her country to come to Hong Kong to seek protection, that even if her claimed risk were real that there was no reliable evidence of any real intention of her creditor to seriously harm or kill her other than to press her to repay her debts, and that in any event it was a private monetary dispute between her and her creditor only without any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant upon her return to Vietnam as well as reasonable internal relocation alternatives for her to move safely to other areas of the country away from her home district without any risk of being located by her creditor that her claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds. On 13 July 2021, 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 in which she just repeated her claim as before 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. 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. In the Applicant’s case, the fact is that it has been 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 Vietnam, there is simply no justification to afford her with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526. 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. Moreover, the Applicant recently on 30 September 2024 filed an affirmation requesting to withdraw her application as it is now safe for her to return to her home country. For all these reasons I am not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and in view of her latest confirmation that it is safe for her to return to her home country, I accordingly dismiss her leave application. Dated the 14th day of January 2025 (Chung Lai Fan, Christine) for Registrar, High Court 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 Notes for the Applicant: If leave has been granted, the Applicant or the Applicant’s solicitors must: a) serve on the respondent and such interested parties as may be directed by the Court the order granting leave and any directions given within 14 days after the leave was granted (Order 53, rule 4A); b) issue the originating summons within 14 days after the grant of leave and serve it in accordance with Order 53, rule 5; and c) supply to every other party copies of every affidavit which the Applicant proposes to use at the hearing, including the affidavit in support of the application for leave (Order 53, rule 6(5)). Sent to the Applicant on 14 January 2025 Vu Thi Hien Applicant’s ref. no.: Nil. Sent to the Putative Respondent / the Putative Respondent’s solicitors / such Putative Interested Parties as may be directed by the Court / the Putative Interested Parties’ solicitors on 14 January 2025 Torture Claims Appeal Board Putative Respondent’s ref. no.: USM 17342/20/11/10/V2616 Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party’s ref. no.: QA T/C 452/20 (Formerly RBCZ 10397/20)(T1I78) Department of Justice, Senior Assistant Law Officer (Civil Law) (Civil Litigation Unit 2) ____________________________________________________________________________ Form CALL-1