MA v The Secretary of State for The Home Department

Facts

The appellant, MA, is a citizen of Afghanistan who was born and raised in Pol-e-Charkhi village on the eastern outskirts of Kabul. He is married with nine children, received no formal education and worked as a taxi driver. His protection claim was that in July 2020 he witnessed a Taliban member known to him as 'M' placing or preparing to place a bomb beneath a small bridge in his village, and that he reported the incident to the police, leading to M's arrest and detention by the then Afghan government. After the Taliban took power in August 2021, M was released and told the new authorities that it was the appellant who had informed on him. The appellant said he was detained by the Taliban for about a week, released only after village elders provided a guarantee or 'zamanat', and then attacked and stabbed at his home at night, after which he fled the country; the Taliban continued to visit his home asking after him. He claimed a well-founded fear of persecution on the basis of actual or imputed political opinion, and risk contrary to Articles 2 and 3 ECHR. He made his protection claim on 25 August 2023; the Secretary of State refused it on 20 November 2024, and a notice of appeal was lodged on 28 November 2024. The respondent accepted his identity and nationality and that, if the account were true, neither state protection nor internal relocation would answer the risk, but rejected the core factual account as incredible.