Expert Evidence in British Asylum Courts: The Judicial Assessment of Evidence on Ethnic Discrimination and Statelessness in Ethiopia

In this chapter, I examine the decisions of adjudicators in the UK's Immigration and Asylum Chamber. The British system is based on the adversarial model, in which the claim of an individual seeking asylum is argued in court before an adjudicator: asylum applicants are normally represented by an independent barrister, and the Secretary of State for the Home Office is represented by a Home Office Presenting Officer, a junior civil servant. I examine how two country guidance cases, both involving claims of statelessness, were argued and decided in the Immigration and Asylum Chamber