International Refugee Law

Matrix members have specialist expertise in all aspects of international protection, including international refugee law, the law of humanitarian protection, and relevant aspects of international human rights law. Matrix also offers expertise in the interaction between international and domestic law in these areas, and members are regularly instructed on high-profile and cutting-edge cases.

Particular areas of expertise include:

• Entitlement to and exclusion from refugee status and humanitarian protection
• Other protection against refoulement / removal, including under the full range of relevant provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights
• Rights for victims of modern slavery / human trafficking
• Revocation of refugee status, including in the context of cessation
• Refugee rights
• The specific position and rights of Palestinian refugees
• Family reunion
• Statelessness
• Status determination procedures, including offshore processing

Members deploy this expertise across a range of contexts, including:

• Applications for judicial review, including of high-level Government policy and decision-making
• Statutory appeals at all levels, from the First-tier Tribunal to the Supreme Court
• Applications to the European Court of Human Rights
• Interventions in important cases before the Administrative Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court
• Interventions before superior courts in other jurisdictions
• Advisory work, both internal and public-facing

Notable recent work includes the following:

• Hugh Southey KC was instructed in R (A) v Minister for Justice [2024] IEHC 183, significant case in which the High Court of Ireland found that the UK was not a “safe third country” for the return of asylum-seekers
• Raza Husain KC, Phillippa Kaufmann KC and Anirudh Mathur were instructed in R (AA (Syria)) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2023] UKSC 42, the successful challenge to the lawfulness of the Government’s plan to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda
• Chris Buttler KC and Jack Boswell are instructed in ongoing litigation concerning claims for international protection by individuals confined to the British Indian Ocean Territories (BIOT)
• Raza Husain KC and Eleanor Mitchell were instructed by Freedom from Torture to provide comprehensive advice on the compatibility of the Illegal Migration Act (then a bill) with the UK’s international protection obligations