Asylum Seekers and Human Rights

Speaker: Julius Nkafu
Chambers: Great James Street

With a broad theme of how human rights laws affect asylum seekers, Julius delves into a subject that never leaves the public spotlight and has become a focus of government policy, dividing the topic into the pre-hearing and hearing stages, covering:

  • Illegal entry
  • Benefits/support
  • Detention of asylum seekers
  • When to make a human rights claim
  • How does the Human Rights Act 1998 help protect asylum seekers?
  • What are the possible human rights claims for an asylum seeker?

Relevant law

European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), 1953

Human Rights Act 1998

Section 55 of the Nationality Immigration and Asylum Act 2002

R v Secretary of State for the Home Department ex parte Limbuela [2005] UKHL 66
M.S.S. v. Belgium and Greece [GC], 30696/09, ECHR 2011

Sufi and Elmi v. the United Kingdom, 8319/07 and 11449/07, 28 June 2011

Ullah v Special Adjudicator [2004] UKHL 26

Huang v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2007] UKHL 11

J v SSHD [2005] EWCA Civ 629

Y (Sri Lanka) v SSHD [2009] EWCA Civ 362

N v UK and Paposhvili v Belgium

Othman (Abu Qatada) v. the United Kingdom, 8139/09, ECHR 2012

Paposhvili v Belgium [2016] ECHR 1113

AM (Zimbabwe) 2018 EWCA Civ 64.

Rhuppiah v SSHD [2016] EWCA Civ 803

Julius Nkafu was called to the English Bar at the Inner Temple in 2014 and called to the Cameroon Bar in 2006. He was enrolled as a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of E&W in 2002. Julius started his legal Career in 1995 at MHQ Solicitors in the Docklands. He set up Julius & Co solicitors in 2006 and in 2010 became a partner at Julliz Solicitors LLP. Julius has extensive expertise in alternative disputes resolution – arbitration and mediation. He is an expert in international arbitration, a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, and a member of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA). He is also a mediator and a barrister called to both the Bars of England and Wales and Cameroon, West Africa.