Asylum seekers allowed to stay in UK despite lying in claims

Asylum seekers have been allowed to escape deportation and remain in the UK despite being found to have lied about their cases, court documents show.

Immigration judges have accepted that migrants challenging their removal have deliberately lied or provided evidence that was “not credible”, but have still granted them the right to remain under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

One judge allowed a 54-year-old Zimbabwean woman’s appeal against deportation, despite evidence that she would “do and say almost anything to try to fabricate a means to remain in the UK”.

Convicted for deception in a previous asylum claim, the woman later concocted a political blog criticising the Zimbabwe regime so that she could claim she would be persecuted if returned.

Another illegal migrant escaped deportation despite “lies” about how few relatives he had in his home country of Sri Lanka, told as part of his legal argument that it would breach his rights to a family life under the ECHR to be returned there.

In backing 52-year-old Puspam Elangeeran’s appeal against deportation, judges cited a previous ruling which stated that “any court or tribunal must be very careful not to dismiss an appeal just because an appellant has told lies”.

It said judges “should not jump too readily to the conclusion that because the appellant has told lies about some matters then his credibility on all matters is fatally undermined”.

The upper immigration tribunal judges backed Mr Elangeeran’s claim on the basis that he had been in the UK since 2000, having mounted successive appeals against deportation.

They ruled it would be “unjustifiably harsh” to return him to Sri Lanka, given the length of time he had lived in Britain.

The tribunal judges said: “Whilst it might be reasonably concluded that the appellant had overstated his case in terms of his lack of remaining ties to Sri Lanka and was prepared to tell lies, it does not necessarily follow that he lied about his continuous residence in the UK.”

The case, disclosed in court papers, is the latest example exposed by The Telegraph where illegal migrants or convicted foreign criminals have used human rights laws to remain in the UK or halt their deportations.

They include an Albanian criminal who avoided deportation after claiming his son had an aversion to foreign chicken nuggets and a Pakistani paedophile, who was jailed for child sex offences but escaped removal from the UK as it would be “unduly harsh” on his own children.

Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said that too often “extremely tenuous claims to be at risk are accepted, or very wide definitions of ECHR articles adopted”.

He said: “No wonder illegal immigrants circulating in Europe want to cross the channel by small boat – they know our system is soft. This has to end.

“People should only be able to make asylum or human rights claims once, and illegal immigrants who lie to the courts should be removed.”

Jailed for fraudulent claim

Like Mr Elangeeran, the 54-year-old Zimbabwean had made a series of applications to try to remain in the UK since she arrived as a student in March 2001. This included a fraudulent claim for recognition of right to abode, for which she was jailed for 18 months in 2009.

She made subsequent human rights claims to stay in 2009, 2010, 2013, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2020 and 2022 before she was refused in 2023.

She appealed on the basis she would be persecuted if returned to Zimbabwe because she was a known critic of the Zanu-PF regime. This was based on her political blogging in the UK.

However, a lower-tier tribunal judge concluded it was “not reasonably likely” that she had a “genuine political belief” opposed to the regime and said her blogging was motivated by an attempt to “manufacture a real risk of serious harm on return to Zimbabwe”.

Nonetheless, the judge said that if she was interrogated by the authorities on her return to Zimbabwe, she would not be believed even if she told the truth – that she had fabricated her asylum claim and was not a genuine critic of the regime.

The judge, therefore, “reluctantly” allowed her appeal to remain in the UK, which was upheld by an upper immigration tribunal.

In separate cases, a Somali found to have lied about fleeing Al Shabaab, the Islamist terror group, was spared deportation and an unnamed man from Gaza was allowed to stay in the UK despite having an initial asylum claim rejected after lying that his life was in danger at home.

Court documents reveal a judge ruled the Gazan man’s 2022 account was “not credible” and he had actually come to the UK “as an economic migrant” – but an upper tribunal decided the judge was wrong to have rejected his appeal.

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