1716887 (Refugee)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal considered the protection visa applications of two applicants who claimed to fear persecution in Taiwan from criminal gangsters due to a gambling debt. The applicants, who had been living in Taiwan for approximately ten years and held passports from the Republic of China (Taiwan), arrived in Australia in April 2016. They asserted they no longer held citizenship of their birth country and therefore had no right to reside there, but the Tribunal found they did have a right to enter and reside in Taiwan as its nationals.

The central legal issue before the Tribunal was whether the applicants met the criteria for a protection visa, specifically whether they had a well-founded fear of persecution in Taiwan or if Australia had protection obligations towards them under the complementary protection criterion. This involved assessing the credibility of their claims regarding the circumstances of their gambling debt, the nature of the threats they allegedly faced from criminal gangsters, and whether Taiwan's authorities could provide effective protection. The Tribunal was required to consider relevant country information and policy guidelines, including those concerning the definition of significant harm and the availability of protection measures in Taiwan.

The Tribunal found that the applicants had not established a well-founded fear of persecution. It noted inconsistencies in the applicant's account of how he incurred such a substantial gambling debt, particularly given his stated income. Furthermore, the Tribunal considered country information indicating that Taiwan has a low crime rate, an effective police force, and an independent judicial system, with active efforts to combat criminal gangs involved in loan sharking. The Tribunal concluded that the applicants had not demonstrated that they could not access effective protection from the Taiwanese authorities or that they faced a real risk of significant harm amounting to persecution. Consequently, the Tribunal affirmed the decision not to grant the applicants protection visas.