Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-000602

First-tier Tribunal No: PA/64302/2023

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

On 4th of September 2025

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE O’BRIEN

Between

SF
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr C Holmes of Counsel
For the Respondent: Ms S Simbi, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Birmingham Civil Justice Centre on 6 June 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. The appellant appeals against the decision of the First-tier Tribunal dismissing his appeal against the respondent’s refusal of his protection and human rights claim.
2. Permission was granted on only one ground: that the judge failed to apply extant country guidance. The full ground asserts as follows:
‘4. Firstly, it is respectfully submitted that the Judge below has failed to correctly apply extant country guidance dealing with the ‘pinch point’ of returns to Iran to his findings of fact. There is no issue that the Appellant is a Kurd. There was likewise no issue that the Appellant has been politically active sur place and has attended demonstrations against the Iranian state in the United Kingdom. The Judge acknowledges at §45 (ii) that the Appellant “would be characterised as a political activist” by the Iranian state. It is settled law that the motivation for his political activities is irrelevant.
5. The Judge errs, however, in her assessment of whether and how those activities might come to the attention of the Iranian authorities. The Judge at §45 states “I am not satisfied that the Appellant is at risk of identification by the Iranian authorities”, and at §45 (i) states
“I am not satisfied that in these circumstances that his attendance alone would be sufficient to identify him as a regular attender and single him out for attention.
6. The Judge’s focus, from §43 onwards, is exclusively on whether or not the Iranian authorities are already aware of the Appellant’s activities through identification here in the United Kingdom. It is respectfully submitted therefore that the Judge’s assessment only answers half the question, and that she has failed to consider the likely attitude of the authorities at the point of return, as required by the country guidance.
7. It is said at headnote 4 of PS (Christianity - risk) Iran CG [2020] UKUT 00046 (IAC):
Decision-makers must nevertheless consider the possible risks arising at the ‘pinch point’ of arrival:
i) All returning failed asylum seekers are subject to questioning on arrival, and this will include questions about why they claimed asylum;
ii) [not relevant]
iii) [not relevant]
iv) If there are any reasons why the detention becomes prolonged, the risk of ill treatment will correspondingly rise. Factors that could result in prolonged detention must be determined on a case by case basis…”
8. The Appellant is a returning Kurd. In light of the ‘hair trigger’ approach taken towards Kurdish returnees as suggested by HB (Kurds) Iran (illegal exit: failed asylum seeker) CG [2018] UKUT 430 (IAC) it is at least reasonably likely that when questioned about the basis of his asylum claim, the Appellant’s acknowledged sur place activities (given that “Even ‘low-level’ political activity… if discovered, involves the same risk of persecution or Article 3 ill-treatment”) might lead to ‘second line’ questioning and ‘prolonged’ detention, such as to amount to real risk of harm applying the guidance in PS (Iran).’
3. In her rule 24 response, the respondent argues that paras 4(ii) & (iii) are relevant. These state in turn:
‘ii) A returnee who divulges that he claimed to be a Christian is reasonably likely to be transferred for further questioning;
iii) The returnee can be expected to sign an undertaking renouncing his claimed Christianity. The questioning will therefore in general be short and will not entail a real risk of ill-treatment;’
4. The r24 response argues in any event that the judge correctly found that the appellant would not be identified on return because: he was not of interest to the authorities before he left, and there was no evidence that his sur place activities would have come to the authorities’ attention.
The Submissions
5. In his oral submissions, Mr Holmes accepted the judge’s findings that the Iranian authorities were not presently aware of the appellant’s sur place activities and that it would be reasonable for him to delete his Facebook account before an application was made for an emergency travel document. He further accepted that there was no live challenge to the judge’s findings that the appellant’s sur place activities were contrived. However, he argued that the judge had failed to consider whether and to what extent those activities would be discovered by the authorities on the appellant’s return. It was necessary for the judge to consider what likely questions would be asked and what the appellant’s likely responses would be (RT (Zimbabwe) [2016] EWCA Civ 1285 at [29]). Furthermore, it was deeply unattractive to expect an individual to avoid persecution by telling lies (RT (Zimbabwe) [2012] UKSC 38 at [71]-[72]).
6. Ms Simbi accepted that the judge had failed to make findings on whether any of the appellant’s contrived sur place activities would be discovered on his return to Iran. However, she submitted that, had the judge addressed her mind to the point, she would inevitably have found that the appellant would have not revealed any of those activities.
The Decision of the First-tier Tribunal
7. The First-tier Tribunal’s material findings on the appellant’s sur place activities and the extent to which they will have come to the Iranian authorities’ attention can be found at [43]-[47] and her consequential conclusions at [52]:
‘Sur place activities- Demonstrations
43. I have considered the level of Appellant’s political involvement in the UK, the likelihood of him coming to the attention of the authorities, and the priority that the Iranian regime would give to tracing him.
44. In accordance with BA I have taken into consideration the publicity demonstrators receive on sites such as Facebook, and the Iranian authorities attempt to identify people demonstrating outside the Iranian Embassy in London by filming and photographing them. I note the Upper Tribunal’s findings that as a result of the large number of people who demonstrate in the UK, the Iranian government is unable to monitor all returnees who have been involved in these demonstrations; and the lack of evidence that the authorities have facial recognition technology at Iman Khomeini International airport that would detect people of interest.
45. I am not satisfied that the Appellant is at risk of identification by the Iranian authorities for the following reasons:
i. The Appellant states that he attended 5 demonstrations but he was unable to provide the dates he attended. I was not referred to any explanation for why he was unable to recall the dates of these demonstrations. I have been referred to his Facebook posts and these establish that he has attended 3 to 4 demonstrations at most. The Appellant accepts that he was not a leader, mobiliser or organiser and there were hundreds of others present. I find that he was only an active member of the crowd. I am not satisfied that in these circumstances that his attendance alone would be sufficient to identify him as a regular attender and single him out for attention.
ii. The Appellant has provided Facebook printouts that show him at demonstrations holding material that would insult and antagonise the Iranian authorities. I accept that he would be characterised as a political activist by the regime if these images came to their attention. In most of the pictures the Appellant is posing with the placards for the camera. I am not satisfied that the Appellant was holding placards for an extended period of time. On his own account there were 500-600 people in attendance and they were all doing the same thing. For all these reasons I am not satisfied that the Appellant’s activities would have singled him out and attracted the attention of the authorities.
iii. I have not been provided with any evidence that the Appellant’s attendance at any of these demonstrations have been posted anywhere other then on his own Facebook page. These photographs have been ‘liked,’ but there is no evidence that those images have been shared or posted by friends who have a significant political profile and would be monitored by the authorities. The Appellant confirmed that he neither spoke to reporters, nor was he recorded by television news crews present. There is no evidence that the Appellant’s attendance at the demonstrations has been broadcast or published by the press.
iv. Even if the Appellant were photographed I am not satisfied that he would be recognised upon return to Iran because the Appellant was not of interest to the authorities when he left Iran.
Sur Place Activities- Facebook
46. I turn to the risk on return arising from a person’s social media use, in particular Facebook and the surveillance of that person by the authorities in Iran. In XX it was found that the evidence fails to show that the Iranian authorities are able to monitor, on a large scale, Facebook accounts. More focussed, ad hoc searches will necessarily be more labour-intensive and are therefore confined to individuals who are of significant adverse interest. The fact that he does not have a Facebook account or has deleted it will not raise suspicions or concerns on the part of the Iranian authorities. The deletion of his account would not amount to persecution as there is no fundamental right protected by the Refugee Convention to have access to a particular social media platform.
47. I have considered where on the social graph the Appellant’s profile fits and the extent to which his or his social network may have their Facebook material accessed. I am not satisfied that the Appellant is of significant adverse interest for the following reasons:
i. The Appellant was not of interest to the authorities when he left Iran.
ii. The Appellant has provided print outs from his Facebook account. He has not provided material from the “Download Your Information” function of Facebook. In accordance with XX I accept that it is easy for an apparent printout to be manipulated by changing the page source data. The printouts provided are therefore of limited evidential value. I do not therefore accept that the printouts establish the dates of the posts or the privacy settings of the posts.
iii. The Appellant has not provided evidence that he is friends with people who are of significant political interest to the Iranian authorities. There is no cogent evidence before me that any of the Appellant’s posts have been shared onto the sites of people who are likely to be of significant interest to the Iranian regime.
iv. The Appellant’s Facebook printout shows he has 1600 friends yet his posts do not attract more than 50 likes. He therefore does not have a high social media profile that would come to the attention of the Iranian authorities.
v. The Appellant would not raise the Iranian authorities suspicions or concerns upon return by not having or deleting his account. The timely closure of his Facebook account would neutralise the risk consequential on having had a “critical” Facebook account.
…
52. I am not satisfied that he is at risk from the Iranian authorities because of his sur place activities and that he has been or is currently monitored by the Iranian authorities. The Appellant does not hold a genuine political belief, in accordance with XX he can delete his Facebook account before an ETD is sought.’

Discussion
8. None of the above findings are criticised. Nor, for the purposes of this appeal, is the judge’s findings that the appellant’s claimed political beliefs are not genuine and that the sur place activities were contrived to bolster his asylum claim ([48]-[49]). Instead, it is submitted that the judge failed to consider the possibility that the Appellant’s sur place activities might lead to ‘second line’ questioning and ‘prolonged’ detention, such as to amount to real risk of harm.
9. The grounds themselves do not make entirely clear how those activities would lead to such consequences. However, Mr Holmes’s argument in short is that the appellant would reveal to the Iranian authorities the opportunistic activities he had undertaken in United Kingdom, when interviewed on return, even if they were otherwise unaware of those activities.
10. Even though Ms Simbi accepted that the judge ought to have made express findings on the point, I do not consider this to be an error of law.
11. First, that is not how the case appears to have been presented before the judge. In her unchallenged summary of his case at [4], the risk arising from sur place activities is recorded as:
‘He is politically active in the United Kingdom (UK). He posts anti-Iranian regime material on Facebook and has attended political demonstrations outside the Iranian Embassy in London. It is likely that the Iranian authorities are aware of his political activities and he would be arrested on return. Furthermore, his political beliefs are genuine and he will continue to express them if returned to Iran.’
12. The ASA did not indicate any departure from the above case, and in particular did not set out the argument as now advanced. Specifically, no reference is made to PS (Christianity), what the appellant would likely be asked on return, and what activities he would reveal even if contrived.
13. Second, and in any event, the appellant did not leave Iran to seek asylum on the basis of political activities but rather because of claimed problems arising from work as a kolbar. The sur place activities were a subsequent feature of the appellant’s case. Consequently, headnote 4(i) of PS (Christianity) is authority for little more than that the appellant would be asked and expected to disclose that he had made a false asylum claim in the United Kingdom on the false basis of being a kolbar. It is not suggested, even in the grounds, that that would lead to persecutory or Article 3 treatment.
14. As it is, the judge did expressly consider risk of detention on return at [50] thus (my emphasis):
‘I note that SSH and HR is not authority for any proposition in relation to the risk on return for refused Kurdish asylum-seekers on account of their Kurdish ethnicity alone. Kurdish ethnicity is a risk factor which, when combined with other factors, may create a real risk of persecution or Article 3 ill-treatment. I have taken into account the Appellant’s ethnicity, the fact that he left Iran illegally, and that he would be forcibly returned from the UK but I am not satisfied on the evidence before me that these factors alone would lead to him being detained by the authorities if returned to Iran.’
15. It is clear from the bold and underlined phrase that the judge considered that the appellant’s ethnicity, illegal exit and forceable return were the only matters which might possibly give rise to a risk (albeit that she concluded they did not). Consequently, it is clear that she did not find that the appellant would disclose any of his sur place activities on return.
16. PS (Christianity) is not authority for the proposition that a returnee would be obliged to volunteer information, not otherwise known by the authorities, on activities undertaken insincerely to create a false asylum claim. Indeed, the subsequent country guidance case of XX (PJAK – sur place activities – Facebook) Iran CG [2022] UKUT 00023 (IAC) held at [98] that the law does not prevent a decision-maker ‘from asking if a person will volunteer to the Iranian activities the fact of a previous lie to the United Kingdom authorities’ and at [102] that ‘it is permissible for a decision-maker to ask what a returnee to Iran will do, in relation to a contrived Facebook account or fabricated protection claim’.
17. The judge expressly found at [52] that the appellant ‘can’ delete his Facebook account before an emergency travel document is sought, and that a lack of Facebook account would raise no suspicions with the Iranian authorities [ibid]. No challenge is made in the grounds to that formulation, and it is clear from reading the decision as a whole that the judge was satisfied that the appellant would indeed delete his Facebook account. It is a necessary corollary that he would not reveal, if questioned thereafter, the prior existence of the Facebook account nor the activity that had been posted thereon. In that respect, it is clear from [45(i)] that the judge only found established the appellant’s attendance at the 3-4 demonstrations shown in his Facebook posts, and so it is clear that she was satisfied that he would not volunteer that activity.
18. Even if I had found it unclear whether the judge had rejected the appellant’s claim to have attended 5 demonstrations [ibid] (and I do not), she nevertheless found that all of his political activity had been contrived [48]. It is simply inconceivable that she would in any circumstance have accepted that the appellant would reveal any activities not published on Facebook and about which the Iranian authorities did not challenge him with evidence. The judge’s unchallenged finding is that the Iranian authorities have no such evidence and would have no reason to be suspicious about the lack of any Facebook account.
Materiality
19. Even if the judge’s failure expressly to consider those questions which would be asked by the Iranian authorities on the appellant’s return and what answers he would give in response constituted an error of law, she did expressly find that the authorities did not know about his sur place activities and would not be suspicious of his lack of a Facebook account. Consequently, it is inevitable that she would have found any questions about the appellant’s sur place activities would be generic, and unevidenced. As for his answers, it is inevitable from her express findings that the judge would have found that he would not volunteer any of the activities undertaken. As for questions about why the appellant claimed asylum, as noted above he would inevitably answer that he falsely claimed to be a kolbar, and it is not suggested that he would suffer persecution or serious harm as a result of that answer.
20. I should add that it was not suggested that the appellant would reveal his contrived activities for fear of making matters worse for himself if caught in a lie. That is unsurprising. Given that it is common ground that the Iranian authorities take a ‘hair trigger’ approach to Kurdish anti-authority political activities, it is hard to see how lying about those activities would make matters worse. Moreover, given the judge’s findings on credibility, it is inevitable that she would have rejected such a claim as unbelievable.
21. Furthermore, the point is well made in XX (PJAK), and confirmed in S v SSHD [2024] EWCA Civ 1482, that unlike the case in RT (Zimbabwe) v SSHD [2012] 1AC 152 the Iranian authorities do not persecute individuals for political neutrality. Given the judge’s unchallenged findings that the Iranian authorities are unaware of the appellant’s sur place activities, it cannot be argued that the appellant would be in the position of having positively to demonstrate his loyalty to the regime.
22. In summary, given the way that the case was argued before the judge, I find that she did not err in failing expressly to find what questions would be asked of the appellant on return. What the judge considered the appellant would reveal even if asked about sur place activities is clear from her express findings: he would not disclose them. Even if the judge did fail to make sufficient findings on either of these points, it is inevitable that she would have found that the appellant’s answers when questioned on return would not give rise to a real risk of persecution or serious harm.
23. For these reasons, the appeal fails and the judge’s decision stands.
Notice of Decision
1. The judge’s decision did not involve the making of an error of law, or alternatively a material error of law, and stands undisturbed.

Sean O’Brien

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

15 August 2025