International Journal of Refugee Law Advance Access originally published online on October 31, 2008
International Journal of Refugee Law 2008 20(4):586-610; doi:10.1093/ijrl/een036
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Withdrawing Protection Under Article 1C(5) of the 1951 Convention: Lessons From Australia
* Lecturer, Faculty of Law, Monash University, Building 12, Wellington Road, Clayton VIC 3800, Australia. Thanks go to my PhD supervisor, Professor Susan Kneebone, for her helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. The law is stated as at 30 Sept. 2008
This article analyses the application of Article 1C(5) of the Refugee Convention in Australia. Article 1C(5) provides that refugee status may cease to apply to a refugee where the circumstances giving rise to his or her refugee status have ceased to exist (for instance, where there has been a relevant change in circumstances in the refugee's home country). This cessation clause has rarely been applied to recognised refugees by states parties to the Convention. However, since 2003, Australian refugee determination bodies have applied the clause to withdraw refugee status from those recognised refugees who hold temporary protection visas. The Australian High Court considered the application of Article 1C(5) in a judgement handed down in November 2006. This article will examine how domestic protection interacts with international refugee status in the context of Article 1C(5). Although this article deals with the application of Article 1C(5) by Australia, it also has broader implications for many other jurisdictions.