Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture
National authorities are often reluctant to arrange for a forensic medical examination or to grant important weight to forensic medical reports in asylum cases. They do not (fully) accept that a forensic medical report may change their initial assessment of the credibility of the applicant’s asylum...
Published in: | Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights |
---|---|
Main Author: | |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | English |
Published: |
SAGE Publications
2020
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full-xml/10.1177/0924051920939879 |
id |
crsagepubl:10.1177/0924051920939879 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
crsagepubl:10.1177/0924051920939879 2023-05-15T18:15:18+02:00 Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture Reneman, Marcelle 2020 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full-xml/10.1177/0924051920939879 en eng SAGE Publications https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ CC-BY-NC Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights volume 38, issue 3, page 206-228 ISSN 0924-0519 2214-7357 Law Political Science and International Relations Sociology and Political Science journal-article 2020 crsagepubl https://doi.org/10.1177/0924051920939879 2022-08-12T11:32:22Z National authorities are often reluctant to arrange for a forensic medical examination or to grant important weight to forensic medical reports in asylum cases. They do not (fully) accept that a forensic medical report may change their initial assessment of the credibility of the applicant’s asylum account. They may argue that a physician cannot establish the context (date, location, perpetrator) in which the alleged ill-treatment has taken place or the cause of a specific scar or medical problem of the applicant. Moreover, they may contend that the physician concerned did not have the expertise to write a forensic medical report. This article examines how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Committee against Torture (CAT) have included forensic medical reports in their assessment of asylum cases and how they have dealt with the ‘context’, ‘causality’ and ‘expertise’ argument. It shows that these bodies do not accept that national authorities refrain from arranging a forensic medical examination or attach no or limited weight to a forensic medical report submitted by the applicant, just because the applicant has made inconsistent, incoherent or vague statements. They also do not accept general references to the ‘context’, ‘causality’ and ‘expertise’ argument. However, they have accepted these arguments in some individual cases, often without clear reasoning. The article concludes that the ECtHR and CAT could provide more guidance to national authorities concerning the role of forensic medical reports in asylum cases by explicitly weighing the seriousness of the credibility issues against the forensic medical report and by paying attention to the requirements for forensic medical reports laid down in the Istanbul Protocol. Article in Journal/Newspaper SCAR SAGE Publications (via Crossref) Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights 38 3 206 228 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
SAGE Publications (via Crossref) |
op_collection_id |
crsagepubl |
language |
English |
topic |
Law Political Science and International Relations Sociology and Political Science |
spellingShingle |
Law Political Science and International Relations Sociology and Political Science Reneman, Marcelle Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
topic_facet |
Law Political Science and International Relations Sociology and Political Science |
description |
National authorities are often reluctant to arrange for a forensic medical examination or to grant important weight to forensic medical reports in asylum cases. They do not (fully) accept that a forensic medical report may change their initial assessment of the credibility of the applicant’s asylum account. They may argue that a physician cannot establish the context (date, location, perpetrator) in which the alleged ill-treatment has taken place or the cause of a specific scar or medical problem of the applicant. Moreover, they may contend that the physician concerned did not have the expertise to write a forensic medical report. This article examines how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Committee against Torture (CAT) have included forensic medical reports in their assessment of asylum cases and how they have dealt with the ‘context’, ‘causality’ and ‘expertise’ argument. It shows that these bodies do not accept that national authorities refrain from arranging a forensic medical examination or attach no or limited weight to a forensic medical report submitted by the applicant, just because the applicant has made inconsistent, incoherent or vague statements. They also do not accept general references to the ‘context’, ‘causality’ and ‘expertise’ argument. However, they have accepted these arguments in some individual cases, often without clear reasoning. The article concludes that the ECtHR and CAT could provide more guidance to national authorities concerning the role of forensic medical reports in asylum cases by explicitly weighing the seriousness of the credibility issues against the forensic medical report and by paying attention to the requirements for forensic medical reports laid down in the Istanbul Protocol. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Reneman, Marcelle |
author_facet |
Reneman, Marcelle |
author_sort |
Reneman, Marcelle |
title |
Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
title_short |
Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
title_full |
Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
title_fullStr |
Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
title_full_unstemmed |
Forensic medical reports in asylum cases: The view of the European Court of Human Rights and the Committee against Torture |
title_sort |
forensic medical reports in asylum cases: the view of the european court of human rights and the committee against torture |
publisher |
SAGE Publications |
publishDate |
2020 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0924051920939879 http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full-xml/10.1177/0924051920939879 |
genre |
SCAR |
genre_facet |
SCAR |
op_source |
Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights volume 38, issue 3, page 206-228 ISSN 0924-0519 2214-7357 |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY-NC |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0924051920939879 |
container_title |
Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights |
container_volume |
38 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
206 |
op_container_end_page |
228 |
_version_ |
1766188403780485120 |