Migrant Who Admitted He Had “No Real Reason” to Stay in UK Allowed to Remain After 9-Year Battle Because Of This

An Iraqi man who came to the UK in 2016 by hiding inside a lorry has finally been allowed to stay in the country, even though he once told officials that he didn’t have a real reason to be there.

When he first arrived and was interviewed by immigration officers, he openly admitted, “I don’t have a real reason to be here. Give me some time and I’ll make one up.” That one sentence caused years of trouble for him, as it made the authorities question his entire asylum claim from the beginning.

At the time of his arrival, he said both of his parents were dead, and he had no family left in Iraq. Despite this, the Home Office refused his request for asylum in 2019. He tried to appeal their decision twice—once in 2020 and again in 2022—but both attempts failed. He had been living with uncertainty and fear of being sent back for nearly a decade.

Finally, his case was brought to a higher court where two judges listened carefully to what had happened to him. He told them he had been captured, held prisoner, and tortured by ISIS and other militia groups back in Iraq. A medical expert from the organisation Freedom From Torture examined him and confirmed that he had injuries and scars that matched the kind of violence he described. One deep scar on his arm, for example, supported his story about someone trying to cut off his arm.

Although some of his stories about the torture weren’t exactly the same every time he told them, the doctor explained this was normal for trauma survivors. People who have gone through extreme pain, fear, and stress often struggle to remember or explain things the same way each time. She believed his injuries were real and his story was believable.

However, the Home Office continued to argue that he wasn’t trustworthy because of his first comment about inventing a reason to stay in the UK.

They tried to use that early statement to discredit his entire case. But his lawyers pushed back, saying that comment was made during an early interview when he was exhausted, scared, and had no legal support. They said it wasn’t fair to judge him harshly based on something said under such pressure.

The judges agreed with his legal team. They acknowledged that when he arrived, he had just endured a dangerous journey, hiding in a lorry, not knowing what to expect. His early statement didn’t mean his later claims were false. They accepted that he had genuinely been mistreated in Iraq, had no family to return to, and no documents to prove his identity. Sending him back would be unsafe and inhumane.

The judges decided that although he might not have known how to explain his situation clearly at first, the overall evidence showed that he had suffered greatly and couldn’t safely go back. They granted him humanitarian protection, which means he can now stay in the UK and build a life in safety, after nine long years of living in fear and uncertainty.