Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER Case No: UI-2025-004102

First-tier Tribunal No: HU/59940/2023
LH/01541/2025

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 10th March 2026

Before

DEPUTY UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE SYMES

Between

SAKURA ENDO
Appellant
and

SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr Solomon
For the Respondent: Ms Nath, Senior Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 3 November 2025

DECISION AND REASONS

1. This Appellant, born 15 January 1987 and a citizen of Japan, appeals against the decision of the First-tier Tribunal of 15 July 2025 dismissing her appeal, itself brought against the Respondent’s refusal (on 4 August 2023) of her human rights claim (made on 2 May 2023).

Background

2. The Appellant arrived in the UK on 24 September 2018 as a student and her leave was extended in the start-up route until 18 March 2023. Her account, accepted by the First-tier Tribunal, was that she and her family were of Japanese origin; she was born and raised in Kenya until the age of twenty-two (residing there on the basis of being her parents’ dependent) when she began work for her father’s travel agency (at which point she obtained a worker visa); she could not speak Swahili but managed in English. Her father passed away in 2020. Her mother continued to reside in Kenya with permanent residence and worked on a self-employed basis. The Appellant sought to herself regularise her status in 2016/2017 but was prevented from so doing by the cost: partly the administrative fee but magnified by the necessity of paying a bribe to a middleman. During her residence in the UK she had developed mental health issues.

Decision of the First-tier Tribunal

3. The First-tier Tribunal found that whilst the payment of a bribe may well have been a typical part of the process which the Appellant's father had also had to face when making immigration applications, this was not sufficient evidence to establish that she could not relocate to Kenya. There was no evidence to suggest the Appellant would be unable to afford the costs of the fee and any necessary bribe by raising the funds via credit facilities if necessary. Any necessary treatment for depression could be adequately treated there and as a well-educated person who could speak English she could live and work there. Thus she would face no very significant obstacles to integration in Kenya.

4. The First-tier Tribunal also indicated it would consider the possibility of her return to Japan. Her evidence was that she had only lived there for a year when aged around five, and her brother had relocated there for a year, around 2018-2019. He had taught English to Chinese students there before moving on to other countries to work. She felt she would be unable to integrate there as a lone female and that her way of presenting herself, and the locals’ expectations of how she should behave, would prevent her from being accepted there. The Tribunal concluded that, notwithstanding the earnestness with which she had presented her difficulties, she would be able to integrate in Japan as her brother had done.

5. Whilst the Appellant had studied, worked and involved herself with charities in the UK, and made friends here, this was not enough to amount to exceptional circumstances individually or cumulatively. Notably she had chosen to apply under the private life route rather than under one of the various working routes available under the Immigration Rules.

The appeal to the Upper Tribunal

6. The Appellant's grounds of appeal argue that the First-tier Tribunal erred in law in

(a) Not properly considering the fact that the proposed removal destination was Japan;

(b) Failing to take account of the importance attributed in the Respondent’s private life guidance to a right to reside in the country of proposed return, and in so doing effectively determining the appeal adversely to the Appellant on the speculative basis of the assumed feasibility of returning there rather than on her right to do so;

(c) Failing to take account of the evidence that the Appellant's father’s travel agency was in the process of closing down, the fact she had been absent from Kenya since 2018, that she was now aged 38, and had never qualified for permanent residence in Kenya as she had not held a work permit for seven years;

(d) Making an irrational finding in concluding that the Appellant could reasonably be expected to engage in corrupt behaviour by bribing a middleman;

(e) Failing to take account of her mental health problems when considering whether she would face very significant obstacles to integration in Japan, and of her evidence that the Appellant considered Japan to be a foreign country to her.

7. The First-tier Tribunal granted permission to appeal on all those grounds on 3 September 2025.

8. The Respondent’s response of 15 September 2025 submits that the First-tier Tribunal was entitled to look at both Japan and Kenya, and that the Appellant had adduced no expert evidence to demonstrate the absence of any immigration route to residence in the latter country. Sufficient reasons had been given as to the possibility of integrating in Japan.

9. For the Appellant Mr Solomon developed the grounds of appeal, essentially submitting that she would face very significant obstacles to integration in Kenya. Ms Nath for the Respondent submitted that there was no indication that the judge’s approach to admissibility to Kenya was challenged, and in any event Japan had been considered as an alternative destination.

Analysis

10. PL5.1(b) of Appendix Private Life asks whether “there would be very significant obstacles to the applicant’s integration into the country to which he would have to go if required to leave the UK”. The Respondent’s Private life Guidance states that

“The assessment of whether there are very significant obstacles to integration will generally consider the proposed country of return, unless there is information to suggest that the applicant might have a choice about where they choose to relocate to, such as where they have a right to reside in a country other than the country of proposed return, or where they have more than one nationality. In that case you can take account of whether there are very significant obstacles to integration continuing in any of the relevant countries.
…
The fact the applicant may find life difficult or challenging in the country of return does not mean that they have established that there would be very significant obstacles to integration there.
…
Common claims
Applicant has no friends or family members in the country of return:
• where there are no family, friends, or social networks in the country of return that is not in itself a very significant obstacle to integration - many people successfully migrate to countries where they have no existing ties”

11. There is thus no objection to the Respondent relying on the Appellant’s potential admissibility and integration in more than one destination.

12. There are essentially two issues in this appeal, firstly the correct legal approach to take to residence in Kenya having regard to the finding that the Appellant would have to pay a bribe to secure immigration status there, the second being the adequacy of the findings regarding her ability to integrate in Japan. If she can reside in Kenya, the country of her upbringing and where she has previously worked and where her mother lives, it can reasonably be assumed that she would not face very significant obstacles to integration there.

13. As to the first, the burden of proof in immigration appeals generally lies on the Appellant. The meaning of foreign law is to be approached as a question of fact and is usually to be proved by evidence of a person with expert credentials (eg Waller LJ in King v Brandywine Reinsurance Company [2005] EWCA Civ 235 at [66]); taking judicial notice of foreign law is rarely appropriate and a bare copy of foreign legislation is unlikely to be informative (CS and Others (Proof of Foreign Law: India) [2017] UKUT 199 (IAC) at [16]).

14. There appears to have been no overt evidence of the relevant provisions of Kenyan law before the First-tier Tribunal, and there was certainly no expert evidence; the Appellant’s skeleton argument makes no reference to any. In these circumstances I consider the First-tier Tribunal was entitled, for the reasons it gave, to conclude that the Appellant had not demonstrated herself as unable to obtain legal residence in Kenya.

15. As to the expectation that the Appellant should pay a bribe if necessary, it seems to me that the First-tier Tribunal was entitled to make that finding. No evidence has been provided as to the relative level of the administrative fee as opposed to the additional element that might be expected by a corrupt official. No evidence has been adduced as to the extent to which the bribe simply represented a lubrication of official wheels, which might well be an expected element of life in Kenyan society, as opposed to procuring a corrupt application of Kenyan law. I can see an argument that a migrant should not be expected to break the law of the country to which they are expected to return, but absent any evidence of Kenyan law from which one could make a finding as to what side of the line the Appellant's difficulties truly lie, I do not consider that argument can get off the ground on the facts of this case.

16. As to the Appellant's difficulties in integrating in Japan, the Rules pose a high threshold before a decision maker can be satisfied there are very significant obstacles to integration abroad. The First-tier Tribunal clearly appreciated her depth of feeling on this issue, noting the earnestness with which she gave her evidence, but there appears to have been no independent objective evidence of the difficulties she might face beyond her own stated opinion. The Judge noted that her brother appeared to have been able to make a living for himself in Japan.

17. It seems to me that the First-tier Tribunal’s conclusion that whilst the Appellant lacked family ties there, the fact remained that she is an educated person with at least some facility for learning languages and who can reasonably be expected to make a life for herself there, taking advantage of the benefits of Japanese citizenship which she is legally entitled to assert, is a reasonable one. As the Respondent’s guidance points out, that the mere absence of family and friends does not prevent successful migration and integration; many migrants across the world, as immigration lawyers know full well, succeed in integrating notwithstanding a lack of prior ties. Given that she has not spent any time in Japan in her adult life, the finding of the Judge below that she would face no very significant obstacles to integration there might be seen as a tough one, but it is not a finding that is irrational or failed to take account of any relevant considerations.

Notice of Decision

The appeal is dismissed.

Mark Symes

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

6 March 2026