The applicant, Sudanese national, applied for asylum in the Netherlands and the State Secretary decided not to process the application because he already applied in Malta. The applicant contested the decision and alleged that he would face detention and poor reception conditions, due to systemic shortcomings. The applicant complained that he would not have access to legal aid and to an effective remedy against detention.

The Court of the Hague allowed the appeal and ordered the State Secretary to take a new decision. The State Secretary appealed against and argued that Malta is responsible to deal with the asylum application, that the principle of mutual trust between Member States is applicable and that there are no systemic deficiencies in Malta. The Council of State allowed the appeal, annulled the Court of the Hague decision and held that a potential breach of the recast Reception Directive provisions does not automatically lead to a violation of the Article 3 ECHR. Moreover, the Council of State considered that the AIDA report provides information according to which although in the vast majority of cases the detaining of asylum seekers is not in line with the Reception Directive, the AIDA report does not show that this information also applies to Dublin applicants. According to the AIDA report, Dublin applicants are not systemically detained after transfer to Malta and in general Maltese authorities are detaining illegally entering asylum applicants based on Article 13 of the Maltese Prevention of Disease Ordinance. On the access to effective remedy, the Council of State noted that the legality of the detention is assessed ex officio by the Immigration Appeals Board (IAB), that if the detention continues, there are also possibilities to have the legality assessed, that free legal aid is available also with UNHCR and other NGOs support.

On reception and detention conditions, the Council of State considered that the applicant did not demonstrate that he would not have access to accommodation and that the allowance would be insufficient to ensure a minimum standard and concluded that there is no evidence as not to apply the principle of mutual trust between Member States.