Germany - High Administrative Court Hamburg, 22 April 2010, 4 Bf 220/03.A

The court stated that according to Art. 60 (1) (4) and (5) of the Residence Act, the facilitated standard of proof of Art. 4.4 of the Qualification Directive has to be considered regarding the question of which standard of proof is to be applied when examining the risk of persecution in case of return. Contrary to the previous view of the Federal Administrative Court, past persecution in the context of recognition of refugee status under the Qualification Directive can no longer be denied because an internal protection alternative existed in other parts of the country of origin. The very wording of Art. 4.4 indicates that an applicant who has suffered persecution in his country of origin, or was directly threatened with persecution there, is entitled to the facilitated standard of proof under Art. 4.4, irrespectively of whether he might also have found refuge in another part of his country of origin at the time of emigration (Federal Administrative Court, 19 January 2009,10 C 52.07).

According to the court’s assessment, there would not be a considerable risk of persecution, in terms of Art. 9 of the Qualification Directive, for the applicant, who had not been subjected to persecution previously, in case of his return to his country of origin. The court stated:
In the recent past, it is not justified to say that members of the Djoula group in Côte d’Ivoire have been at risk of becoming victims of acts of persecution in terms of Art. 9 of the Qualification Directive. Even after the peace treaty of March 2007 there were a number of ethnically and/or politically motivated clashes in Côte d’Ivoire. These incidents, however, were not comparable in type, extent and intensity with the acts of violence and the armed hostilities that took place during the civil war in September 2002 and the time thereafter.

The high level of crime in Côte d’Ivoire and the risk of falling victim to severe crimes linked with it, does not per se constitute a valid reason to establish a fear of persecution in terms of Art. 9 and 10 of the Qualification Directive.
Finally, there is no reason to fear that the situation for (Muslim) Djoula in Côte d'Ivoire, with regard to possible persecution, will change in the near future. Therefore, having regard to the standard of ‘substantial likelihood’ necessary in this context, the risk of a future group persecution can be excluded. There are no signs of a possible change of the current situation.