On 12 February 2014, Mark Symes was part of the legal team acting for the intervenors in Tarakhel v Switzerland (Apn No 29217/12) in the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. The case poses the question, to which the answer is hotly awaited across the whole of the European Union, of whether reception conditions for asylum seekers in Italy are so poor as to amount to inhuman and degrading treatment such that other Member States should take responsibility for asylum claims rather than returning asylum seekers to Italy under the Dublin II Regulation. The judgment is expected later in 2014.
Mark was instructed by the intervenors: the AIRE Centre, the European Council for Refugees and Exiles and Amnesty International.
Mark is a member of the Garden Court Chambers Immigration and Asylum Team.
