Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER Case No: UI-2025-002102
First-tier Tribunal No: PA/53495/2024
LP/11795/2024

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 9 October 2026

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE O’CALLAGHAN
DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE PAUL LEWIS

Between

KK
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
And

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:

For the Appellant: Mr. Greer, counsel instructed by WTB Solicitors
For the Respondent: Ms. Newton, Senior Presenting Officer

Heard at Manchester Civil Justice Centre on 6 October 2026

DECISION AND REASONS

Order Regarding Anonymity

Anonymity was ordered by the First-tier Tribunal. We have considered the merits of the Order and maintain it. The appellant’s case is to be reheard at the First-tier Tribunal. At this stage, his article 8 ECHR rights and the risk to him from disclosure of his identity outweigh the public interest in open justice.

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.

Background and matters in issue
1. The appellant is an Iraqi national of Kurdish ethnicity. On 19th November 2021 claimed asylum on the basis of his race, religion and political opinion. The respondent refused his claim on 8th November 2023.
2. The appellant appealed to the First-tier Tribunal. In a decision promulgated on 25 March 2025, a First-tier Tribunal Judge ('the judge') dismissed the appeal.
3. On 9 May 2025, First-tier Tribunal Judge Fisher granted permission to appeal on four grounds, to which we return below.
4. Before the judge, the respondent accepted that the appellant is a Sunni Muslim who had been subjected to efforts to forcibly convert him to Shia Islam. His family home was visited on a number of occasions in 2021. His father was abducted and, the appellant says, killed as a result of his father's refusal to convert.
5. The appellant claims that, on learning of his father's death, he set fire to two military vehicles, and that as a result the Popular Mobilisation Forces ('the PMF') want to kill him. The respondent disputed that the appellant was wanted for setting fire to the vehicles, and that he was at risk of forced conversion.
The hearing
6. The appellant was represented by Mr Greer, counsel. The respondent was represented by Ms Newton, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer.
7. The respondent did not file a response under rule 24 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008. At the hearing, Ms Newton conceded that grounds (1) and (3) were made out because the judge's reasons were inadequate.
8. At the conclusion of the hearing, we told the parties that the judge's decision involved the making of a material error on a point of law, and that it would be set aside. We now give our reasons.
Discussion
Ground (1): risk on return by reason of ethnicity and religion
9. Mr Greer submitted that the judge failed to assess the risk to the appellant on account of his ethnicity or religion.
10. At [16], the judge found that the appellant 'does not hold any characteristics that would put him at risk on return'. Ms Newton conceded that this finding was inadequately reasoned. She accepted that it was not rooted in the background country evidence about the ongoing risk to the appellant, so it was not tolerably clear on what basis the judge reached it.
11. We are not bound by that concession, but having considered the judge's decision for ourselves, we agree with it. The finding at [16] is inadequately reasoned. The error is material. The respondent accepted that the appellant is a Sunni Muslim who had been subjected to attempts at forced conversion, and that his father had been abducted. Against those accepted facts, a properly reasoned assessment of the risk to the appellant on account of his religion and ethnicity was central to the appeal.
Ground (3): findings of inherent improbability
12. Mr Greer submitted that at [13(c)] to [13(i)] the judge found various aspects of the appellant's account inherently improbable. He argued that those findings were not grounded in any background country information, so they amounted to speculation rather than reasonably drawn inferences.
13. Having regard to the judge's reasoning, Ms Newton conceded that the judge did not give sufficient reasons for those findings.
14. We have considered the judge's reasons with care and, again, we agree with the concession. In our view, the findings at [13(c)] and [13(d)] are inadequately reasoned. The judge made findings about how and why the appellant was able to attack, and then escape from, a military compound. However, those findings do not identify any inconsistency in the appellant's account. They appear to rest instead on the judge's view that the account was inherently improbable. The judge did not, as he was required to, explain why he reached that view. Findings of inherent improbability must be approached with caution and must be grounded in the evidence.
15. Those findings went to the core of the disputed part of the appellant's account: whether he is of adverse interest to the PMF. The error is therefore material. Given that conclusion, it is unnecessary for us to decide whether the remaining findings at [13(e)] to [13(i)] are also flawed.
Grounds (2) and (4)
16. At ground (2), Mr Greer submitted that the hearing was unfair, because the judge developed his own theory of the case based on propositions that were not put to the appellant in cross-examination. Further, at ground (4), it was said that the judge's findings about the whereabouts of the appellant's identity documents amounted to a material error of fact.
17. Having found that grounds (1) and (3) are made out, we do not need to consider grounds (2) and (4).
Disposal
18. The parties submitted, and we agree, that no findings of fact can be preserved. The errors we have identified go to the judge's assessment of credibility and risk on return.
19. Extensive fact-finding will be required. Having regard to paragraph 7.2 (b) of the Senior President's Practice Statement we are satisfied that it is appropriate to remit the appeal to the First-tier Tribunal.
Notice of Decision
1. The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal involved the making of a material error on a point of law. The decision is set aside, with no findings of fact preserved.
2. The appeal is remitted to the First-tier Tribunal in Manchester to be heard afresh by a judge other than First-tier Tribunal Judge Malik.

Paul Lewis
Deputy Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber
8th October 2026