The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has just ruled against Switzerland for having wanted to unjustly return a homosexual Iranian applicant to his country. The young man, aged 34 and who lives in Zurich, claimed that he had to leave Iran when his family learned of his sexual orientation.
He had requested asylum in Switzerland in 2019. But the State Secretariat for Migration (SEM) had rejected his request, considering “that he would not run any risk in the event of expulsion to Iran if he continued to lead his private life there discreetly,” reports the Court on Tuesday in a press release.
The Federal Administrative Court followed the SEM. The applicant therefore appealed to the ECHR and his expulsion was suspended in November 2022 pending the outcome in Strasbourg.
According to the young man, he was at high risk of being arrested on his return, of being mistreated or of being killed by the authorities, his family or society. He further argued “that the Swiss authorities had not carried out a complete assessment of the risks linked to his expulsion to a country where homophobia and discrimination against LGBT people are commonplace”, explains the Court.
The ECHR therefore ruled in his favor. She considers that the prohibition of such ill-treatment, provided for in Article 3 of the Convention on Human Rights, would be violated if he returned to Iran. It therefore ordered Switzerland to pay 7,000 euros to the applicant for the moral damage suffered and for his costs and expenses.
