X., an Ethiopian national of mixed Amhara ethnicity on his father’s side and Oromo ethnicity on his mother’s side, lodged a subsequent asylum application in Belgium on 21 December 2022, after having been granted refugee status in Greece on 15 February 2019. His application was based on political grounds, as his parents allegedly belonged respectively to the Amhara movement BEADEN and the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF). The applicant claimed that his father was imprisoned in 2007 or 2008 and killed in 2009, and that his mother was killed by the OLF on suspicion of having passed information to BEADEN. After being orphaned, he reportedly lived with his paternal uncle, whom he described as a member of the Amhara party ABN and a criminal, who mistreated him daily and left him for dead after a severe beating by him and his associates in 2014.

According to the applicant, these events led to complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which was supported by several medical certificates. Specific procedural arrangements were therefore granted by the Belgian Commissioner-General for Refugees and Stateless Persons (CGRS), including transportation by taxi to the interview premises, exemption from waiting in the waiting room, time-limited interviews, and consideration of his medical condition during the procedure.

The application was initially rejected by the CGRS on 6 May 2024. That decision was annulled by the Council for Alien Law Litigation (CALL) on 21 November 2024. The CGRS subsequently rejected the application again on 14 January 2025, finding the applicant’s account not credible.

Regarding the security situation in Ethiopia’s Oromia region, the CGRS referred to CEDOCA’s “COI Focus Ethiopia, Security Situation in Oromia” of 26 March 2024, which reported arbitrary arrests, prolonged detention, and extrajudicial executions by government forces, as well as attacks and kidnappings by the Oromo Liberation Army. However, the CGRS concluded that there was no exceptional situation of indiscriminate violence within the meaning of Article 48/4(2)(c) of the Aliens Act. It also found that the applicant had not sufficiently demonstrated that his personal circumstances, including his health condition, would expose him to a real risk of serious harm upon return.

The applicant appealed before the CALL, which, on 18 September 2025, annulled the decision. The council recalled that it has full jurisdiction in both fact and law and conducts a full ex nunc review. It further noted that under Articles 4(1) of the recast Qualification Directive (QD) and 13(1) of the recast Asylum Procedures Directive, the applicant has a duty to cooperate in establishing the facts. However, referring to the CJEU judgment in M.M. v Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform and Others (C-277/11, 22 November 2012), it emphasized that the assessment of the merits is the exclusive competence of the determining authority and that the applicant’s duty to cooperate does not apply at this stage.

The CALL upheld the refusal of refugee status under Article 48/3 of the Belgian Aliens Act, agreeing that the applicant’s account lacked credibility. The council noted that he was unable to provide concrete and detailed information regarding his parents’ political involvement and the circumstances of their deaths. In particular, the applicant gave inconsistent statements regarding his father’s political affiliation, alternately claiming that he belonged to BEADEN and to ABN. He also provided contradictory accounts of his uncle’s ethnicity and political affiliation, at times describing him as Oromo and affiliated with the OLF, and at other times as Amhara and affiliated with ABN. Furthermore, while the applicant initially stated in the questionnaire that his uncle was involved in organ trafficking, he failed to mention this allegation during his personal interview. Additionally, although he claimed that his uncle had been involved in his mother’s murder, he was unable to explain how this had occurred. The council also considered the applicant’s statements concerning the years he allegedly lived with his uncle to be vague. His account of the neighbour who allegedly helped him escape was similarly general and insufficiently substantiated. In light of these inconsistencies and omissions, the CALL concluded that the applicant had not credibly demonstrated a well-founded fear of persecution on political or ethnic grounds and therefore did not qualify for refugee status.

The council further observed that the applicant’s appeal did not effectively refute these credibility findings but merely reiterated his claims and argued that consideration should be given to the decision of the Greek asylum authorities, which had already recognised him as a refugee. He also maintained that his mental health problems had not been properly taken into account.

The council acknowledged the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in R.C. v Sweden (9 June 2010), in which the burden of proof was shifted to the State where medical evidence corroborated a generally consistent asylum account. However, it also referred to the subsequent ECtHR judgment in R.J. v France (19 September 2013, No 10499/11), in which the court held that a medical certificate alone does not establish a causal link between medical findings and the applicant’s statements unless those statements are sufficiently credible. The CALL agreed with the CGRS that medical certificates must be assessed as part of the overall evidentiary framework and do not constitute standalone proof. In the present case, it found that the applicant’s account lacked credibility, and that his claim for refugee status claim was not substantiated.

With regard to subsidiary protection, however, the CALL reached a different conclusion. It examined both the updated country of origin information (COI) and a psychiatric certificate submitted during the judicial proceedings. Referring to the CJEU judgments in Meki Elgafaji and Noor Elgafaji v State Secretary for Justice and Security (C-465/07, 17 February 2009) and Aboubacar Diakité v Commissaire général aux réfugiés et aux apatrides (C-285/12, 30 January 2014), the council recalled that the CJEU distinguishes between two situations: first, where there are substantial grounds to believe that a civilian would face a real risk of serious harm solely by being present in the territory; and second, where the applicant’s personal circumstances reduce the level of indiscriminate violence required to establish eligibility for subsidiary protection under Article 15(c) of the recast QD.

Having considered the updated COI Focus of 14 May 2025, the CALL agreed with the CGRS that there was no exceptional situation in the Oromia region characterised by such a high level of indiscriminate violence that the applicant would face a real risk solely by virtue of his presence. Nonetheless, it noted that the updated COI also demonstrated that access to essential services, including healthcare, education, water, and sanitation, has been severely affected by violence and the destruction of infrastructure. It further noted that, according to the medical certificates on file, the applicant suffered from PTSD and psychoses, experiencing muteness, disorientation in time and space, dissociation, severe sleep deprivation, anxiety, apathy, minimal contact, day-night inversion, strange behavior, and reported hearing voices. The CALL noted that the psychiatric certificate confirmed that the applicant’s medication had been adjusted, and inferred that he needed this medication to maintain his mental health at a stable level, while the COI indicated reduced access to healthcare and medication in Oromia.

Considering these findings, the CALL found that, in the event of return to his region of origin, where he would have no or limited access to treatment, the applicant’s mental health would likely deteriorate, causing his symptoms to reappear or worsen. It concluded that this deterioration would impair his ability to assess and respond to risks arising from the security situation, thereby increasing his vulnerability, and held that there were substantial grounds to believe that the applicant would face a real risk of serious harm within the meaning of Article 48/4(2)(c) of the Aliens Act if returned to Ethiopia, thereby warranting subsidiary protection.