Deportation to North Macedonia of a long-time non-citizen resident owing to criminal activity

Facts

The communication is submitted by S on behalf of her husband B, a national of North Macedonia. B arrived in Australia with his mother when he was 3 years old and was given permanent resident status. He never acquired Australian nationality. He has not left Australia since his arrival in 1968. He is married to an Australian national and has two sons of Australian nationality. He suffers from various health problems and has no connection to North Macedonia apart from his nationality. The Australian authorities canceled his permanent visa owing to his substantial criminal record including assault, property offences, serious traffic offences, drug offences, a weapons offence, and domestic violence offences. He filed a request for revocation of the cancellation, which was rejected. He requested judicial review, which was also rejected. The author claims that by removing B, the State party would violate his Covenant rights under articles 12 (4), prohibiting the arbitrary deprivation of the right to enter his own country, 17 relating to right to privacy, and 23 relating to family life protections.

Admissibility

The author initially only claimed violations of article 12 (4) of the Covenant. Because the author failed to provide an explanation for the late claims, the articles 17 and 23 claims were inadmissible. The article 12 claim was admissible.

Merits

A State party must not arbitrarily prevent individuals from returning to their own countries. The Committee found that even though B never applied for nationality, Australia is B’s own country because B has no meaningful connections to North Macedonia and has close and enduring connections with Australia. There are few circumstances in which deprivation of the right to enter one’s own country could be reasonable. Here, the State party did not respond to B’s argument that he would be unable to re-enter Australia after his removal owing to his criminal record, and did not explain whether it considered less drastic measures. It is unlikely that B would be able to re-enter Australia after removal owing to his criminal record and the decision not to revoke the cancellation in his visa, leading to his removal to North Macedonia, was arbitrary and constituted a violation of his rights under article 12 (4).

Recommendations

The State party should, inter alia, ensure that B has the opportunity to re-enter Australia and to provide him with adequate compensation.

Implementation

Deadline for implementation: 17 September 2023