1904678 (Refugee)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal reviewed a decision of the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection not to grant a protection visa to the applicant, a citizen of Vietnam. The applicant claimed to fear persecution from the Vietnamese Government, specifically police and local authorities in his home province of Ha Tinh. He alleged that this fear stemmed from his participation in a protest against the compulsory acquisition of land used for his family's market business in 2012, during which he resisted arrest and sustained an injury.

The Tribunal was required to determine whether the applicant had a well-founded fear of being persecuted for one or more of the five prescribed reasons under section 5J(1) of the *Migration Act 1958* (Cth). If not, the Tribunal had to consider whether there were substantial grounds for believing that, as a necessary and foreseeable consequence of his removal to Vietnam, he faced a real risk of suffering significant harm. The Tribunal also considered the provisions of section 36(2B) of the Act, which outline circumstances where a real risk of significant harm is not taken to exist, including the possibility of reasonable relocation within the country, the availability of protection from authorities, or if the risk is faced by the general population and not personally by the applicant.

The Tribunal found that the applicant had established his identity as Mr B, a citizen of Vietnam. While acknowledging the applicant's account of the land protest and his resistance to arrest, the Tribunal ultimately affirmed the delegate's decision not to grant a protection visa. The reasoning focused on the absence of evidence that the applicant met the criteria for a protection visa under section 36(2) of the Act, particularly in relation to the prescribed grounds for persecution or significant harm. The Tribunal did not find that the applicant satisfied the requirements for a protection visa.