Judgment of the European Court of Justice: family reunification was wrongly refused to persons temporarily admitted

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It is a defeat for Switzerland before the European Court of Human Rights: four temporarily detained people from Eritrea and China had complained to the court that their right to family life had been violated. This is because Switzerland refused to bring their close relatives into the country.

Such family reunification is, among other things, linked to the condition that one is not dependent on social assistance benefits.

The court in Strasbourg has now concluded that dependence on social assistance should be recognized as one of the criteria in an overall picture. But it does require careful consideration of interests in each individual case.

Needs not well balanced

For example, in one case the application was rejected while the person had a full-time job. However, her salary would not be enough to support four other family members. However, the person concerned “did everything that could be expected of him to provide for himself and to cover the costs of his family”.

The court finds “that the authorities have not properly weighed the needs of the applicants”. Only in one case did Switzerland, and with it the State Secretariat for Migration, get the law. Switzerland must now pay compensation of between 5,000 and 15,000 euros.

Not the first time in criticism

It is not the first time Switzerland has been reprimanded for family reunification. By law, anyone who has been admitted to Germany only temporarily cannot apply for family reunification until three years after entering Germany. This is different in many EU countries such as Germany, France or Spain.

The Federal Administrative Court has ruled that the Secretariat of State for Migration can no longer apply the rules strictly and is thus adapting to a leading judgment of the European Court of Human Rights. He had stated that with a waiting period of three years, the family would be separated for a very long time. If the waiting period exceeds two years, the individual case must be assessed on an individual basis and the best interests of the child must be taken into account. The State Secretariat for Migration now only examines applications after a year and a half, wrote the “Tages-Anzeiger”.

(brother/SDA)

Source:Blick