Asylum seeker can stay as papers to fight her case were a day late

A TURKISH asylum seeker has been allowed to stay in the country because the Home Office was a day late in lodging court papers to fight the case.

Birgul Guven, 45, a divorced mother of two, had won the right to remain in Glasgow, but that decision was overturned after an appeal by Jacqui Smith, the then home secretary.

However, documents relating to the appeal were filed a day after the five-day limit expired.

Yesterday, three judges at the Court of Session in Edinburgh ruled that the appeal was null and void, and restored the original decision to grant asylum to Ms Guven.

She arrived legally in the UK in 2008 to visit her sister, and then claimed asylum.

She said she would be persecuted by the authorities if she were returned to Turkey because of her political views.

Ms Guven, a Kurd, said she was a supporter of the Socialist Party of Kurdistan and had taken part in demonstrations against the authorities.

Her family held hard-left political views, and she alleged she had been detained on four occasions and had been beaten and abused.

Ms Guven took the case to the Court of Session, where the issue became the timing of the home secretary's application.

Lord Reed, with Lords Hardie and Mackay, said Ms Smith had been served with notice of the tribunal's original decision on 8 January last year. Under the 2002 Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act, the request for a rehearing needed to be submitted within five business days – but was made on 15 January.