Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-000164

First-tier Tribunal Nos: PA/60357/2023
LP/04811/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

23rd May 2025

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE SHERIDAN

Between

TTN
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
And

THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: In person
For the Respondent: Mr K Ojo, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 9 May 2025

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellant is granted anonymity. No-one shall publish or reveal any information, including the name or address of the appellant, likely to lead members of the public to identify the appellant. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS
1. This decision is given orally following a hearing on 9 May 2025.
2. The appellant is a citizen of Vietnam who claims to face a risk of serious harm in Vietnam both from the state and from non-state actors. The appellant’s claims were considered by the First-tier Tribunal in a decision dated 4 October 2024 where his appeal was dismissed.
3. A panel of the Upper Tribunal comprising of myself and Deputy Upper Tribunal Judge Rodger set aside the decision of the First-tier Tribunal but preserved most of the findings. The only aspect of the decision that was not preserved concerned the appellant’s sur place activities and the appeal before me today (re-making the decision of the First-tier Tribunal) is limited to risk arising from sur place activities.
4. The appellant gave oral evidence and was cross-examined by Mr Ojo. His evidence was that since coming to the UK he has attended one demonstration against the Vietnamese authorities which took place in 2022. When asked why he had not attended other demonstrations he initially stated it was because of health reasons but later stated it was because demonstrations take place on a Sunday when he needs to attend church.
5. The appellant’s evidence was that he does not have a social media presence where he criticises the Vietnamese regime and is not (and has never been) active in, or a member of, a political party.
6. As highlighted by Mr Ojo, a preserved finding from the First-tier Tribunal is that the appellant was not a member of a political party and did not participate in any political demonstrations in Vietnam before coming to the UK.
7. Mr Ojo submitted that the appellant has failed to demonstrate that mere attendance at a single demonstration would put him at risk when he has no profile in Vietnam and is not involved with any political organisation and is not politically active. Mr Ojo drew my attention to the respondent’s CPIN on Opposition to the State dated August 2023. He maintained that the content of the CPIN supports his position that a person such as the appellant, whose anti-regime activity consists of attending a single demonstration in the UK, would not face a risk of persecution.
8. The appellant’s response was to highlight that at the demonstration he held a poster with the name of a person who was arrested and detained for raising money for a charity and who was imprisoned between 2021 and October 2024.
9. I agree with Mr Ojo. The appellant was not politically active in Vietnam and since coming to the UK in 2021 has not been involved with any opposition groups or anti-regime activity apart from attending a single demonstration approximately three years ago. There is not a reasonable degree of likelihood that the appellant’s minimal activity will have brought him to the attention of the Vietnamese authorities or that it would put him at risk of persecution.
10. Although it was not strictly necessary to do so because of the limited scope of the appeal before me today, Mr Ojo referred to the principles in HJ (Iran) v SSHD [2010] UKSC 31 and submitted that this would not apply in the appellant’s case because he would not need to alter his conduct on return to Vietnam to avoid persecution. I agree with Mr Ojo. In the light of the appellant’s lack of political activity both in Vietnam before he came to the UK and since arriving in the UK, I am satisfied that the appellant would not engage in any anti-regime activity in Vietnam and his reason for this is that he would have no wish to do so rather than a fear of being persecuted by the authorities. The HJ (Iran) principle does not therefore assist the appellant.
Notice of Decision
11. A panel of the Upper Tribunal set aside the decision of the First-tier Tribunal. I now re-make that decision and dismiss the appeal.

D. Sheridan

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

23 May 2025