2007571 (Refugee)

The applicants, a married couple from Bangladesh, sought protection visas in Australia. The first applicant arrived in July 2012 and was joined by his wife in April 2014. They applied for protection visas on 7 February 2018, after holding various temporary visas. The first applicant claimed he feared harm from his wife's father due to their "love marriage," which was not approved by her family. The second applicant did not make independent claims but sought protection as a member of the first applicant's family unit. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal reviewed the decision to refuse the protection visas.

The central legal issue before the Tribunal was whether the first applicant qualified for a protection visa under either the "refugee" criterion (s.36(2)(a) of the Migration Act 1958) or the "complementary protection" grounds (s.36(2)(aa)). This involved determining if he had a well-founded fear of persecution for a Convention reason or if there were substantial grounds for believing he would suffer significant harm as a necessary and foreseeable consequence of removal to Bangladesh. The Tribunal was also required to consider the relevant guidelines and country information.

The Tribunal considered the applicant's claims regarding his relationship and fear of his father-in-law. It noted that the applicant had made multiple return visits to Bangladesh since arriving in Australia, as had his wife, without apparently encountering the feared harm. The Tribunal concluded that it was not satisfied that the applicant was a person in respect of whom Australia had protection obligations under either the refugee or complementary protection criteria. Consequently, the applicants did not satisfy the requirements for a protection visa.

The Tribunal affirmed the decision not to grant the applicants protection visas.