CJEU: Requests for a preliminary ruling from the German Federal Administrative Court – C-540/17 Hamed and C-541/17 Omar

Date: 
Friday, September 15, 2017

On 15 September 2017, the German Federal Administrative Court lodged two identical requests for preliminary rulings to the Court of Justice of the European Union regarding the possibility to reject an application for international protection as inadmissible on the ground that refugee status has been granted in another Member State and where there are concerns about the living conditions in the state that granted international protection. The questions referred to the CJEU are similar to those referred in case C-517/17 Addis, but this time they refer to the situation in Bulgaria, not Italy, and raise questions regarding an infringement of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the provision of subsistence benefits. The questions in both cases (C-540/17 and C-541/17) read as follows:

Does EU law preclude a Member State (in this case, Germany) from rejecting an application for international protection as inadmissible on the ground that refugee status has been granted in another Member State (in this case, Bulgaria), in implementation of the power under Article 33(2)(a) of Directive 2013/32/EU 1 or under the rule in Article 25(2)(a) of Directive 2005/85/EC 2 that preceded it, if the form which the international protection takes, and, more specifically, the living conditions of persons qualifying as refugees, in the other Member State which has already granted the applicant international protection (in this case, Bulgaria),

(a) does not meet the requirements of Article 20 et seq. of Directive 2011/95/EU 3 and/or

(b) infringes Article 4 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and/or Article 3 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms?

If Question 1(a) or (b) is to be answered in the affirmative, is this also the case where

(a) persons qualifying as refugees in the Member State in which they so qualify (in this case, Bulgaria) do not receive any subsistence benefits at all, or those which they do receive are very limited by comparison with those available in other Member States, but they are to that extent not treated any differently from nationals of that Member State,

(b)    persons qualifying as refugees are, admittedly, formally treated in the same way as nationals of that State with regard to the conditions relating to subsistence but in fact have greater difficulty in accessing the corresponding benefits and there is no integration programme appropriately tailored and addressing the special needs of the persons concerned such as to ensure de facto equivalent treatment to that of nationals of that State?

 


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Keywords: 
Accommodation centre
First country of asylum
Inadmissible application
Material reception conditions