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LONDON--A gay Romanian, who fled his country because of hostility to homosexuals, lost his battle for asylum in the high court yesterday because his treatment fell short of persecution.
Gabi Ragman, 25, left Romania for Britain after he was told he had brought shame on the university where he studied and would not be allowed to become a physical education teacher. But "uncaring and cruel" treatment suffered by gay people did not necessarily amount to persecution, Mr Justice Scott Baker ruled.
To be entitled to refugee status under the 1951 Geneva convention applicants had to show a "well founded fear of persecution". The judge rejected Mr Ragman's application for judicial review of an adjudicator's decision last year upholding the home secretary's refusal to grant him asylum.
Dismissing the challenge, the judge said Mr Ragman suffered insults and ridicule after it became known that he was homosexual. But the logical conclusion to the argument of his case was that "all known homosexuals" from Romania would then be entitled to asylum in the UK.
The judge said: "The right protected by the convention is not a right to practice as a homosexual. It is the right not to suffer persecution for doing so." This case demonstrated that there could "be various degrees of hostility towards homosexuals that nevertheless fall short of persecution".
Mr Ragman, who arrived in the UK in 1998, was regarded as a credible witness on the treatment he had received in Romania, the judge said. His problems arose in his final year at university when it became known that he was homosexual. The university's director called him to the front of an assembly of students and told him that he had brought shame on the institution.
It was decided by the college that Mr Ragman could finish his physical education course but would never be allowed to teach because he would be "a danger to children".
Romanian society was hostile to homosexuals, the judge added, and the public attitude there was that homosexuals were insane. Mr Ragman was insulted every time he left home, in a situation that resembled "a free theatre." There was no one to turn to for help.
The Romanian government had altered the law to allow homosexual acts between consenting adults in private because the country wanted to join the European Union, but society's attitude did not appear to have changed.
The adjudicator had concluded "with regret" that the hostility experienced by homosexuals in Romania, "uncaring and cruel though it is, is not of such a nature and severity as to amount to persecution". The judge said the court should not interfere with this conclusion.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2000.
Source : Obtained from
gaywired.com
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