Women refugees adopting gender equality can receive asylum: EU court

LUXEMBOURG: Women refugees adopting the European Union´s principle of gender equality can be considered deserving of asylum status, the European Court of Justice ruled on Tuesday.

The decision requires such women -- including minors -- to show they “genuinely” hold that principle dear after lengthy stays in an EU country, and that adhering to it clashes with norms in their country of origin.

That would make them “a particular social group” with grounds to fear or suffer persecution in that country, the court said. The ruling arose from the case of two Iraqi teenagers who had been living in the Netherlands since 2015 and whose asylum applications had been rejected.

The two resubmitted, saying they had adopted the norms and values of Dutch peers. Returning them to Iraq, which does not offer women and girls the same rights as men, would leave them unable to adapt, they said.

They stated that they therefore feared “being exposed to a risk of persecution due to the identity which they have formed in the Netherlands,” according to the EU court´s statement.