Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-001224

First-tier Tribunal No:
[PA/02253/2024]

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:

4th November 2025

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE RUDDICK

Between

SA
(ANONYMITY DIRECTION MADE)
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr C. Jacobs, instructed by Scott Montcrieff & Associates Ltd.
For the Respondent: Mr Tufan, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 10 October 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 him. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS

1. The appellant is a citizen of Afghanistan who says he was born on 26 September 2005. He says he left Afghanistan in August 2021, fleeing the Taliban. He arrived in the UK in September 2022. He later said that he told the respondent’s officers when he arrived that he was 17 years old, but there is no written record of this. His screening interview record shows that he was assigned a date of birth of 1 January 2004, but the record does not show how this date was arrived at or that he was asked any questions about his age. He said his Taskera was at home in Afghanistan.
2. On 1 October 2022, however, two of the respondent’s officers completed an age assessment in which they recorded his claimed date of birth as 1 January 2005 but determined that the applicant’s physical appearance and demeanour “very strongly suggests that they are significantly over 18 years of age”. They assigned him a date of birth of 1 January 1977 [sic], which was then automatically entered as his age in his Asylum Completion Questionnaire and his Substantive Interview and formally given as his age in the decision refusing him asylum.
3. There is no recording of the hearing before the First-tier Tribunal, but the Judge’s note of the proceedings records that the respondent accepted at the outset of the hearing that the appellant had been born in either 2004 or 2005. The respondent’s Presenting Officer then raised the appellant’s alleged claim to have been born in 1977 as damaging to his credibility. The appellant is recorded as replying:
“I start from the beginning I clearly said in response to the age question that I am 17 years old and as is the case in Afghanistan not very good at date of birth issue the guy said you are either 19 or 20 to respond to my answer told me say truth otherwise I will put you as 50 or 60 year old in the documents so I responded this is my age if you want to record me as 50 years old that is up to you. And then they give me some papers with my date of birth remember security guy looked at me and told me how old are you shocked 17 no you are very old in these documents and this was repeatedly happening to me people start laughing at me why is your document like this look at my face start laughing not this age on the other points you mentioned differences as I said I am not very good with dates tell you my correct date of birth 26 September 2005 this is my date of birth.”
4. At the appeal, the Presenting Officer initially stated she was unaware of the October 2022 age assessment. After having sight of it and taking instructions, she accepted that this age assessment had been created by the respondent and did relate to the appellant but nonetheless submitted that the appellant had himself been inconsistent about whether he had been born in 2004 or 2005 and that she therefore intended to cross-examine him about his age.
5. The grounds of appeal turn in part on how the FTT dealt with this highly unusual age dispute in the challenged decision.
The challenged decision
6. After briefly setting out the documents before it and the parties’ positions, the FTT turned to the appellant’s age as a preliminary issue. It recorded that the respondent “stated that 1 January 1977 was clearly not the appellant’s date of birth and that it was likely between 2004 and 2005.”: [10] The appellant’s representative welcomed the concession that the appellant was not 47 years old, but submitted that this should have been accepted at the review stage and not at the outset of the hearing. Because the refusal decision rejected the appellant’s credibility in part because of the different ages he had supposedly given, the entire decision was “tainted”. [11]. The decision continues:
“12. I provided for an adjournment so that the respondent could take time to confirm their position. The respondent told me that whilst the respondent did not consider the date of birth to be 1 January 1977, the respondent wanted to cross-examine the appellant about the identity document relied upon with 2005 as the date of birth given the different dates of birth put forwards by the claimant during their asylum claim. I suggested to the respondent that the age of the appellant on entry and SCR, especially if a minor, might be material as relevant to my assessment. The respondent submitted that the decision was reached on the basis of different dates of birth having been provided and cross-examination would establish the inconsistency.
“13. A failure to observe relevant procedures when interviewing minors does not automatically mean that any answers are inadmissible but it does affect the weight to be attributed to that evidence and decision-makers must be cautious if relying on those answers. I drew the parties attention in particular to the case of AA (Afghanistan) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2007] EWCA Civ 12 that addresses the general prohibition on interview of minors and as to caution if drawing adverse inferences from discrepancies in interviews. I gave the parties time to consider that decision as it was an authority that I would likely take account of when assessing the evidence. A more recent authority is JA (Afghanistan) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2014] EWCA Civ 459.
“14. I address further below a matter that came up in re-examination in relation to the age issue. I find it of concern and unsatisfactory that the respondent altered its position as to the appellant’s age only at the outset of the appeal hearing especially given the requirement to conduct a meaningful review.”
7. The next sections identified the issues in dispute ([15]-[16]), state that the Tribunal heard evidence from the appellant and submissions from the representatives ([17]-[18]) and set out the legal framework ([19]-[24]). At [25]-[29], the FTT identified political opinion (or imputed political opinion) as the Convention ground relied on by the appellant. At [33]-[47], the FTT considered the country background with care. It discussed the position taken in the respondent’s CPIN on fear of the Taliban ([34]-[35]), the EU Agency for Asylum Country Guidance from August 2024 ([37]), the US position about why Afghans in the US were entitled to Temporary Protected Status and the appellant’s submissions about it ([38]-[41] and [43]), and the respondent’s CPIN on the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan ([42] and [44]). It then directed itself to the Upper Tribunal’s guidance in Roba (OLF-MB confirmed) Ethiopia (CG) [2022] UKUT 1 (IAC) that “As a matter of law, I must adopt the country guidance save where in assessing the evidence before me there is evidence that material circumstances have changed and such changes are well established evidentially and durable.”
8. At [46], the FTT concluded that the country evidence did not justify departing from the guidance in AS (Safety of Kabul) Afghanistan CG [2020] UKUT 00130 (IAC) that “it is not in general unreasonable or unduly harsh for a single male in good health to relocate to Kabul”. At [47], it concluded that “the background evidence does not support conclusions that all persons are at real risk of persecution and/or serious harm from the Taliban although there are categories of persons such as those who were previously government or security officials and potentially their known family members.” The evidence did not establish that living conditions generally breached article 3.
9. At [48]-[94], the FTT gave its reasons for rejecting the aspects of the appellant’s account that could have put him at risk from the Taliban, namely that he has worked as a bodyguard for a high-profile opponent of the Taliban named “Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf” and that his father’s cousin had worked in intelligence and had been blamed for an incident in which three or four Taliban commanders had been killed. Having rejected that account, the previous findings about country conditions led to the dismissal of his asylum claim at [96]-[99] and his article 3 claim at [100]-[106].
The grounds of appeal
10. The appellant appealed on six grounds. In the grant of permission, he was granted permission to appeal on Grounds One and Three, but not Ground Two. The grant was silent about Grounds Four, Five and Six. As the parties agreed at the hearing before me, this meant that all but Ground Two were before me.
11. Ground One is entitled “Failure to Consider Procedural Irregularities in Age Assessment and Credibility Findings”. Under this heading, the appellant makes three complaints about the FTT’s credibility assessment:
(i) The FTT failed to take into account the degree to which the respondent’s reasons for refusing the claim were tainted throughout by the respondent’s assignment of the 1977 year of birth.
(ii) The FTT had erred by placing the weight it did on the appellant’s answers at his screening interview because it had treated the appellant as an adult and not taken into account his age or maturity at the time. It had failed to follow the guidance in AA (Afghanistan) and JA (Afghanistan).
(iii) At para. [69], [72], [82] and [83], the FTT had erred by taking adverse credibility points that were not raised in the refusal decision, on cross-examination, or in submissions. There relate to specific details of what the appellant had said at various times about his work for Mr Sayaf and the photographs that he relied on. This was not pursued before me at the hearing, which focussed on other claimed errors in the credibility assessment.
12. Several of these points were repeated under Ground Three, “Failure to Properly Assess the Appellant’s Credibility in Context, and Section 8 consideration”. The new grounds raised here were:
(i) The FTT was irrational to place adverse weight on the fact that Abdul Rab Rasul Sayaf’s had been given as Abdul Rab Raoul Sayaf in the Asylum Continuation Questionnaire, which the appellant could not have completed himself as he does not speak, read or write English.
(ii) The FTT’s erred in rejecting the genuineness of the appellant’s Taskera simply because it was issued when he was 10 years old and listed him as “married”. This was expanded on in submissions before me, where it was pointed out that the appellant had said he was engaged as a child, and that the FTT had acknowledged the continuing customary practices of child engagements and marriages.
(iii) The FTT erred by putting adverse weight on the appellant’s failure to claim asylum en route to the UK. Section 8 had not been raised by the respondent prior to the hearing and the FTT had erred by not taking into account his age and the fact that he was reliant on smugglers, by disregarding the explanations the appellant had given when his failure to claim was put to him for the first time at the hearing, by taking adverse points about his journey that were never put to him, and by treating Iran and Turkey as “safe” countries for Section 8 purposes.
13. Ground Four was entitled “Misapplication of the Legal Framework on Risk on Return.” This ground was that the FTT failed to apply the lower standard of proof to the issue of future risk, both by ignoring the country evidence and by focussing on inconsistencies in the appellant’s account rather than its “overall plausibility”.
14. Ground Five was entitled “Failure to Properly Address Article 3 (Living Conditions) Claim” and asserted that the FTT had ignored updating country evidence and erred by relying on outdated country guidance caselaw. It also took issue with the FTT’s finding that at [47] “there are persons who have returned to Afghanistan since August 2021” on the grounds that this had not been raised previously and there was no basis for it. As Mr Jacobs accepted at the hearing, this was based on the respondent’s CPIN, as clearly set out at [35].
15. Ground Six, “Failure to Properly Consider Supporting Evidence” challenged the FTT’s failure to give weight to the Taskera or the photographs said to corroborate the appellant’s account of his work for Sayaf.
The hearing
16. I am grateful to both representatives’ thoughtful contributions at the hearing. The FTT determination is long and detailed, and the grounds somewhat repetitive and in places unclear. Mr Jacobs and Mr Tufan both helpfully focussed on what they saw as the key issues in dispute, thereby furthering the overriding objective.
17. At the end of the hearing, I indicated that I would allow the appeal because the FTT’s credibility findings were undermined by its failure to make a decision about the applicant’s age during his journey to the UK and his screening interview or to adequately take his age into account, and because of the reliance on credibility points that were never raised. I also indicated that there was no error in the FTT’s careful consideration of the evidence of country conditions; on the contrary, the detailed consideration of the up-to-date country evidence and the self-direction to Roba made the decision to rely on AS (Afghanistan) unimpeachable. Other judges might have taken a different view of the humanitarian situation, but the FTT’s conclusions on the this issue were obviously reached with care after anxious scrutiny of the evidence and within the correct legal framework. Nonetheless, the risk on return would fall to be assessed according to country conditions at the time of the renewed hearing.
18. I now set out my reasons in more detail.
Discussion
19. In deciding whether the FTT’s decision involved the making of a material error of law, I have reminded myself of the principles set out in a long line of cases, including Ullah v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2024] EWCA Civ 201, at [26], Yalcin v SSHD [2024] EWCA Civ 74, at [50] and [51], Gadinala v SSHD [2024] EWCA Civ 1410, at [46] and [47], and Volpi & Anor v Volpi [2022] EWCA Civ 464, at [2-4] and of the danger of “island-hopping”, rather than looking at the evidence, and the reasoning, as a whole. See Fage UK Ltd & Anor v Chobani UK Ltd & Anor [2014] EWCA Civ 5 [114].
20. Having read the decision as a whole, I consider it clear that the FTT never reached a decision about what the appellant’s age was when he left Afghanistan in 2021, travelled across Asia and Europe in 2021 and 2022, and arrived in the UK in September 2022. When considering what weight to put on the appellant’s answers at his screening interview, the FTT noted at [49] that “whilst the respondent does not concede the appellant was aged under 18 at that point, the respondent accepts that the appellant’s dated of birth is likely to fall in 2004 or 2005.” The FTT then directed itself that the burden of proof as to age is on the appellant, but nowhere made a finding as to age.
21. The first consideration of the appellant’s age in the credibility assessment reflected this indecision. It is at [55], where the FTT noted that “the appellant’s online application was prepared as an adult, albeit a very young one on the age he asserts”. In the same paragraph, the FTT stated “I remind myself about caution in drawing adverse inferences from answers given in the SCR in all the circumstances but it is as an adult that the appellant completed his online form and again as an adult that he gave his oral evidence.” This obscured the fact that the FTT did, in fact, later draw significant adverse inferences from the screening interview records (at [68] and [90]) without explaining why it was appropriate to do so. It is as if, as Mr Jacobs submitted, the fact that the appellant was an adult at the hearing was read back in time to give more weight to his answers as a child at his screening interview.
22. At [56], the FTT referred to the appellant’s claim to have been subject to control by a smuggler and a child during his travel to the UK, but it began the next paragraph, “That said his evidence is that he had periods of time living in Iran and Turkey with family friends and […] the appellant presents as having a degree of independence during this period.” [emphasis added] In other words, less weight was put on the fact that he was a child and under the control of the agent while he was in Europe because he had had a “degree of independence” in Iran and Turkey. Having read the documents before the FTT and the record of proceedings, it is entirely unclear where the evidence of this independence was. He was not asked about his life in Iran and Turkey at his substantive interviews. In his October 2023 statement and Asylum Continuation Questionnaire (ACQ), all he said was that after arriving in Tehran by truck, he stayed there for “about 10 months” until his uncle sent him £2500 through the Hawala system and advised him to get in touch with an agent in Tehran, “a Kurdish guy.” The agent then took “us” to a house, where he stayed with 21 other people for two weeks before crossing into Turkey on foot. After he arrived in Istanbul, he contacted his uncle, who “advised me to wait there until he contacts some of his friends in Istanbul to help me.” He was living with a family friend for “about 19 days” until he “received a phone call, he was an Afghan guy a friend of my uncle, he asked for my address and told me to be prepared the next night because someone was going to pick me up.” The next day, “another Kurdish guy” who spoke Farsi “took me to a place with other refugees”, from there to the cost, and from there to Greece by small boat. It is difficult to understand how the FTT could have considered that this account so clearly demonstrated the appellant’s quasi-adult degree of independence that it meant less weight should be put on the fact that he was, in fact, a child.
23. At [58], the FTT reminded itself that the appellant was “potentially aged 17 and a minor at this point.” “This point” is not identified. The preceding paragraph covered the appellant’s entire journey from Iran (early August 2021, by his account) through France (September 2022). By his account, he was born on 26 September 2005, and thus 15 at the beginning of his journey and barely 17 at his screening interview the UK. Even the respondent’s concession that his date of birth was “likely to fall in 2004 or 2005” allowed that he was “potentially” 16 for some of this period. At [59], the FTT refers again to the appellant’s “claimed date of birth”. An account of the various dates of birth recorded in the respondent’s records followed, but the consideration ended at [68] with the inconclusive statement that the “appellant’s information at his screening interview resulted in the assigned 2004 date of birth.” At [68], the FTT placed adverse weight on the date recorded in the screening interview for when the appellant left Afghanistan, in spite of the need to be “cautious as to the weight to be given to the answer at SCR in light of the possibility that the appellant was then aged under 18.” The uncertainty about the appellant’s age thus continued throughout the next stage of the credibility assessment, which considered his substantive answers and omissions at his screening interview.
24. Reading the decision as a whole, I acknowledge that many of the adverse credibility points arising from the appellant’s screening interview were revisited in the consideration of inconsistencies between his 2023 statements and his accounts at his first and second interviews, between [70] and [81]. For this reason, any error in putting weight on the screening interview without having decided how old the appellant was at the time might not have been material, if there were no other errors in the credibility assessment. However, given that credibility must be assessed in the round, the more errors there are in the assessment, the less sustainable the ultimate conclusion becomes.
25. I find that the FTT did not deal fairly with the issue of the appellant’s failure to claim asylum en route to the UK, both because the FTT relied on matters that were never put to the appellant at any time and because of the ongoing uncertainty about the appellant’s age. It was acknowledged at the hearing that the appellant’s failure to claim asylum before reaching the UK had not been raised in the refusal decision, but it was also accepted that the FTT was a “deciding authority” under Section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004 and required to take this behaviour into account as potentially damaging his credibility ([50]-[52]). As the matter had never been previously raised, however, it was incumbent on the FTT to consider it with care, and in particular, to ensure that it did not rely on any aspects of the appellant’s account that he was never asked to explain. There were nonetheless multiple places at which the FTT found that the appellant’s credibility was undermined by aspects of his behaviour during his journey or of his account of his journey that had never been put to him. Taking the journey chronologically, this included that he had been “living with a degree of independence in Iran and the with family friends in Turkey” [55], as noted above. This is repeated again at [57], where the FTT notes that
“his evidence is that he had periods of time living in Iran and Turkey with family friends and even if those countries are not ‘safe countries’ for the purpose of section 8 the appellant presents as having a degree of independence during this period of time before agents were engaged either directly or via his uncle who was sending money to travel onwards to the UK.”
26. It is not entirely clear what was meant by this, but it introduced the paragraph in which the FTT concluded that “he did not take advantage of a reasonable opportunity to claim asylum in a safe country.” If the FTT was treating Iran and Turkey as safe countries under Section 8, this is wrong in law. If it was treating them as de facto safe countries, there was no evidential basis for this. If it was inferring from this “degree of independence” that the appellant should have intervened to prevent the uncle from contracting with the agents to take him to the UK, (i) this should have been put to the appellant, and (ii) there is no consideration of the fact that he was at most 17 years old at the time. I also consider that the vague phrase “some degree of independence” is a continuing reflection of the FTT’s failure to make a decision about how old the appellant actually was at the time, as Mr Jacobs ably submitted.
27. At [55], the FTT drew an adverse inference from the appellant having not given “any particularly detailed explanation about his time in Bulgaria bearing in mind he refers to being in a ‘locked camp’ and a ‘more free’ camp for a period of time of several months.” The Judge’s notes, however, show that he was not asked for any details. The record reads:
• “So when I came to Bulgaria said immediately wherever I am detained they will collect our fingerprints locked camp in Bulgaria for a while after that I was in a more free camp
• You were in direct contact with auth in Bulgaria
• Yes
• Why did you not claim asylum
• So I didn’t have any information about claiming asylum there when we were in the free camp after that we started our journey towards here”
28. In the same paragraph, the FTT takes issue with the appellant’s failure to mention Bulgaria in the travel history recorded in the ACQ, which was considered a “significant omission”, and that the account of going from Afghanistan to Iran “omits mention of Pakistan which borders Afghanistan on the Kabul side.” Neither of these points were put to the appellant. It is particularly concerning that the FTT seems to assume that the appellant must have travelled through Pakistan, when Pakistan is east of Afghanistan and therefore not obviously on the route to Europe. In fact, the appellant said at his asylum interview and his appeal statement that he left Afghanistan overland via Nimroz, crossing directly into Iran. As Nimroz borders Iran, it is unclear why he should be presumed to have detoured through Balochistan or Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province instead and be faulted for not mentioning it.
29. Finally, even considering the high standard for a finding of irrationality, I find it irrational that the FTT placed any weight on the misspelling of “Rasul” as “Raoul” in the appellant’s October 2023 ACQ and statement. It was not in dispute that the appellant could not read or write English at the time, such that he cannot have written the statement, which is in fluent English. Moreover, the separate statement from which the ACQ answers appear to be cut and pasted contains a reference to “Rasoul” as well as to “Raoul”, which suggests that a typographical error is an obvious possibility. Most importantly, neither the online form nor the accompanying statement of the same date contains a confirmation that it was read back to him word-for-word in a language he understands, and the FTT accepted at [74] that it may not have been. There would therefore appear to be no basis for deciding that the ”different sound between ‘Raoul’ and ‘Rasoul’ when spoken” meant that the appellant had been aware of the misspelling but “left the inaccuracy” in the statement and that it was “implausible” that the appellant would have gotten the name “wrong” if he had been working for Sayaf. As Mr Tufan volunteered at the hearing, moreover, Rasul is a Muslim name but Raoul is not. It is implausible that the appellant would have thought an Afghan commander had a non-Muslim name. It is not as if he had referred to Mr Sayaf as Rasul in one place and Raheem in another.
30. Many of the FTT’s credibility points were cogent. Nonetheless, because credibility must always be assessed in the round, I consider that the credibility assessment as a whole must be set aside for the reasons set out above. As to the separate ground challenging the reason for rejecting the Taskera, I consider that it is not made out; the FTT clearly distinguished at [84] between customary practices of child marriage and what is plausible in an official document generated in 2015. However, given the approach to foreign documents dictated by Tanveer Ahmed, the weight to be given to that document will need to be reconsidered following a fresh credibility assessment.
31. As noted above, there is no error in the FTT’s assessment of general country conditions as at the date of the hearing. Given the passage of time, however, those conditions will need to be reassessed afresh in light of up-to-date evidence.
32. For these reasons, the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of material errors of law requiring it to be set aside in its entirety.

Notice of Decision
The decision of the First-tier Tribunal promulgated on 17 December 2024 is set aside in its entirety. The appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal for a fresh hearing on all issues, before any other judge.

E. Ruddick

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

21 October 2025