Directorate of Immigration Decision of 20 January 2003

1. Subject matter

Asylum and residence permit application.

2. Minor's legal representative

Salo first instance general court has decided on 22 October 2002 that X is appointed as the legal representative of the minor applicant Y.

3. Application

The application is based on the oral accounts of the applicant and her uncle, who resides in Finland. According to the uncle the applicant arrived in Finland on 29 September 2002. She has applied for asylum on 30 September 2002 in Helsinki Police Station. The applicant says that her father, step-mother and sister saw her off at the airport. She also says that she knew she was coming to Finland to her uncle. She cannot tell any details about her journey. According to her uncle, a middle-aged Somali man brought the child to his house. The uncle says that he was not informed before hand about the child's arrival. He says, however, that he verified form his brother in Mogadishu by telephone that he had sent his daughter to Finland.

The applicant has presented to Finnish authorities a list written by her father on her relatives in Somalia. According to the list, applicant's father, father's two wives and 15 step-siblings live in Somalia. Two of the step-siblings have already established their own families in Somalia. According to the information given to the authorities, the applicant's parents are divorced and she had staid with her father after the divorce.

Y tells that she was comfortable with her family in Mogadishu. She also says that it was dangerous to play outside because of the occasional shooting in the neighbourhood.

4. Decision

Directorate of Immigration does not grant asylum to the applicant but issues her a fixed-term residence permit on grounds of need of protection until 20 January 2004 (status A.3).

The applicant is also entitled upon a separate application to an alien's passport where the residence permit shall be stamped.

5. Statement of reasons

The applicant has not presented credible documents to verify her identity which has complicated the asylum procedure. She has, furthermore, not presented travel tickets to support her account on her travel route.

Directorate of Immigration holds that the applicant has not presented in her application any facts for which she would have a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion in her country of nationality pursuant to Section 30 Subsection 1 of the Aliens' Act.

According to the applicant, she comes from Mogadishu. Even though, according to the information of the Directorate of Immigration, there can be long, militarily peaceful periods in Mogadishu, the political situation in the region is complex and, at times, unstable. The security situation varies from one part of the city to another.

The applicant is an unaccompanied minor who has entered Finland to apply for asylum. According to the UNHCR's Guidelines on Unaccompanied Minors, a minor asylum seeker cannot be returned to his country of origin if it cannot be ascertained that he will be received there appropriately. The Directorate of Immigration has thus far not been able to check the circumstances of the applicant's family in Somalia. According to the information given to the Directorate of Immigration, applicant's father has intentionally sent his child to his relatives in Finland. The Directorate of Immigration holds, however, that the applicant is in need of protection.

Directorate of Immigration has in its decision making taken into consideration the best interest of the child and all relevant facts and circumstances in their entirety.

6. Applicable law

Aliens' Act Sections 1c, 5.2, 15, 30.1, 31, 32 and 33.1 and 2

Aliens' Decree Section 20.2

Finnish Constitution Section 9.4

European Convention on Human Rights Article 3

UN Convention on the Rights of a Child Article 3