An Ethiopian national entered Germany in 2019 and applied for asylum, although she had already been granted international protection in Italy, where she had subsequently been issued a refugee travel document valid until October 2022. The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) rejected her asylum application as inadmissible and issued a deportation order to Italy.

The applicant appealed the decision before the Bavarian Administrative Court, which upheld the rejection of her asylum application. However, the court found that she could not be returned to Italy and ordered BAMF to issue her a new travel document pursuant to Article 28(1) of the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. It also ruled that BAMF should grant the applicant a residence permit pursuant to Section 25(2), sentence 1, of the Residence Act.

The BAMF further appealed against this decision before the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig, arguing mainly against the obligation to issue a residence permit.

The Federal Administrative Court allowed the appeal on points of law and disagreed with the lower court, finding that the factual requirements for granting a residence permit pursuant to section 25 (2) sentence 1 of the Residence Act were not fulfilled because it was the Italian authorities which granted the refugee status and not the BAMF. The court clarified that an analogous application of the provision was excluded in the absence of an explicit provision to this extent. The court justified that this interpretation of the provision was also in accordance with international and the EU law because neither the provisions of the Geneva Convention nor Article 24 (1) of the recast Qualification Directive obliged a Member State to grant a residence permit to a refugee recognised in another Member State. The court affirmed that only the state that has granted refugee status to the person concerned is obliged to issue a residence permit.

Thus, the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig clarified that, when another Member State has granted refugee status and issued a travel document to an asylum applicant (here Italy), another Member State (in this case: Germany) is not obliged to grant the refugee a residence permit in the event of a transfer of responsibility under the European Convention of 16 October 1980 on the Transfer of Responsibility for Refugees.