On 24 November 2010 the UK Supreme Court decided on the correct approach to be taken towards untruthful statements made by asylum seekers in their asylum claims, MA (Somalia) (Respondent) v. Secretary of State for the Home Department (Appellant).
The case concerned MA, a member of the Somali Isaaq clan. It was evident to the Asylum Immigration Tribunal (AIT) that MA was lying about the extent of his ties to "powerful actors" in Mogadishu and could not show that he would be at real risk under Article 3 ECHR if returned. The Court of Appeal had decided that the AIT could not make any relevant findings as a result of inaccurate information supplied by MA.
The Supreme Court held that the AIT was not wrong in assessing MA's untruthful statements. They acknowledged the difficulty in assessing asylum applications, where it is obvious that the applicant is being untruthful. They held that a claimant's wholly incredible account can only be made good where "there is undisputed objective evidence about conditions relevant to that country" which override the untruthful account of the claimant. In this instance the AIT found that the lies were of great significance as they concerned a central issue of the applicant's claim.