AJ (Tuvalu)

COURT OR TRIBUNAL

New Zealand Immigration and Protection Tribunal

DATE FILED (OR FIRST HEARING DATE)

20/03/2017

LITIGATION TYPE

Constitutional and Human Rights / State Accountability

SUBJECT MATTER

Human rights and refugee claims

REVIEW TYPE

Merits review

SUMMARY

(Excerpt from judgment)

[1] These are appeals against a decision of a refugee and protection officer, declining to grant refugee status and/or protected person status to the appellants, a family comprising a husband, wife and two minor children. The husband and children are citizens of Tuvalu; the wife is a citizen of Fiji. The mother is the responsible adult for the two child appellants for the purposes of section 375 of the Immigration Act 2009 (“the Act”).

[2] The appellants claim to be at risk of being persecuted or being subjected to forms of qualifying harm on a number of inter-related grounds. First, they raise concerns about the adverse effects of climate change on Tuvalu and, in particular, the effects on life and livelihoods because of rising sea levels and associated environmental processes and events. Further, it is claimed the family has no home to go to in Tuvalu and they will face extreme financial hardship. There is a lack of clean water and proper sanitation. No specific claim is raised by the wife in relation to Fiji.

…

[5] For the reasons which now follow, the Tribunal finds that the appellants are not entitled to be recognised as either refugees or protected persons under the Act. Such humanitarian circumstances as may exist in regard to the adverse effects of climate change on the Tuvaluan population, the presence of family members here and the illness afflicting the husband’s mother fall outside the scope of either jurisdiction.

CASE DOCUMENTS

AJ (Tuvalu) [2017] NZIPT 801120