Cyprus violated the right of a Moroccan asylum seeker to freedom, detaining him for 131/2 months for reasons of national security, the European Court of Human Rights ruled yesterday.
The Strasbourg Court found that his detention was not sufficiently linked to the prevention of illegal entry into the country and lasted longer than was reasonably necessary for that purpose. The information on which the suspicions against him were based remained unchanged, while no progress had been made in the judicial examination of the asylum case.
In a unanimous decision issued on 1 October, the ECtHR awarded the applicant, referred to as K.A., compensation of €5,000 for non-pecuniary damage. He dismissed, however, his separate complaint that the failure to disclose confidential information did not allow him to effectively challenge the lawfulness of his detention.
K.A. remained in the Menogia Detention Center from January 10, 2019 to February 24, 2020. The decision of the ECtHR is final.
The authorities detained him on the day he applied for asylum, after a service of another country cooperating with the Cypriot authorities had registered him as a "category B" suspect. This charge concerned persons suspected of operational action in support of a terrorist group.
Following his interview with members of the Police and the Cyprus Intelligence Service, the immigration authorities issued a detention order for him on national security grounds.
According to the previous decision of the Administrative Court, he had entered Cyprus through the occupied territories in December 2018. Neither decision names the foreign agency or the terrorist group, nor does it mention a conviction for a terrorist offence.
The ECtHR found that the Cypriot authorities did not clearly define the purpose of the detention. Immigration authorities and the Administrative Court repeatedly invoked national security as a separate reason for detention, while other authorities and the Supreme Court linked detention to the examination of his asylum application.
The Asylum Service had recognized him as a refugee in April 2019, but revoked his refugee status on national security grounds and rejected his application for international protection. The decision was upheld in July 2019, following an administrative appeal by him. In October of the same year, he appealed to the Administrative Court of International Protection.
The European Court of Justice noted that after the decisions of the administrative authorities, no further interviews were conducted for the asylum application. In reviewing his continued detention, the immigration authorities did not rely on new evidence or seek additional information. Also, it did not appear that any actions were taken to proceed with the case after his appeal to the Administrative Court of International Protection.
The ECtHR concluded that his detention was not sufficiently linked to the prevention of illegal entry into the country. It considered that its duration, 131/2 months, exceeded the time reasonably necessary for this purpose, as no particular complexity of the asylum application had been demonstrated and no progress had been made in its judicial examination.
Therefore, it found a violation of Article 5 § 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which enshrines the right to liberty.
K.A. had challenged the original detention order before the Administrative Court, which dismissed his appeal on 22 April 2019. The court held that his registration in a foreign database as a terrorist suspect was sufficient to justify detention and that less restrictive measures would not effectively protect national security. He then filed separate applications with the Supreme Court, challenging the length of his detention. The first was rejected in August 2019, but the second was accepted on February 24, 2020.
The Supreme Court ordered his release, after finding that the state had not provided either the material previously examined by the Administrative Court or substantive evidence to support the latest decision to continue detention. Without them, he could not assess whether the reasons for his detention still existed.
The examination of his appeal against the decision of the Administrative Court of April 2019 continued after his release. The appeal was rejected by the Supreme Constitutional Court in October 2024.
As for his complaint about confidential data, the ECtHR did not find a violation of Article 5 § 4, which enshrines the right to judicial review of the lawfulness of detention.
It considered that the applicant had been informed of the legal basis and reasons for his detention, had been informed of relevant information in the administrative file and had the opportunity, through his lawyer, to contest the allegations made to him. The Administrative Court, as an independent judicial body, had access to the classified documents.
The ECtHR concluded that the applicant had sufficient opportunity to develop his positions before the courts.
According to the decision, K.A. now resides in the province of Larnaca, at an address known to the authorities. At the time of the ECtHR's examination of the case, its appeal against the rejection of the application for international protection was still pending.
