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Children 'unprotected' after court ruling: agency

TT/The Local/cg
TT/The Local/cg - [email protected]
Children 'unprotected' after court ruling: agency

Sweden's Migration Board (Migrationsverket) can't stop children coming to Sweden, even when there's a risk that they'll be exposed to violence and assault from a step parent, according to a court ruling from the Migration Court of Appeals (Migrationsöverdomstolen).

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"This doesn't feel good. In future, we won't be able to protect a child from obvious risks," said the board's legal head Mikael Ribbenvik to newspaper Dagens Nyheter (DN).

The case in question concerned a man who in 2008 was sentenced to gross violation of a woman's integrity (grov kvinnofridskränkning) against his ex-wife, as well as assault and sexual assault against his children and step children.

The Migration Board denied an application for residency from a foreign woman who'd initiated a relationship with the man, since the woman has a 15-year-old son.

The Migration Court (Migrationsdomstolen) also turned the application down, but the couple appealed the decision, which was overturned by the court of appeals.

The couple had gotten married before the judicial review, and Swedish authorities are not permitted to check criminal records before approving residency permits for married couples.

Despite this, the Migration Court ruled that, considering the man's crimes, it was incompatible with the child's safety to approve the permit.

The court of appeals, however, ruled that it was not possible to put the good of the child first, wrote DN.

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