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However, family unity must be maintained where that applicant is the father of a child who is an unaccompanied minor who has been granted subsidiary protection in the first Member State

After being granted refugee status in Austria in 2015, the appellant moved to Belgium at the beginning of 2016 to join his two daughters – one of whom was a minor – where the latter were granted subsidiary protection in December of that year. In 2018, the appellant submitted an application for international protection in Belgium, without having a right of residence there.

That application was declared inadmissible under the Belgian law transposing the Procedures Directive, 1 on the ground that the appellant had already been granted international protection by another Member State. 2 The appellant challenged the decision refusing his application before the Belgian courts, claiming that respect for family life and the need to take into account the best interests of the child, enshrined in Article 7 and Article 24(2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (‘the Charter’) respectively prevent Belgium from exercising its option to declare the application for international protection inadmissible.

In that context, the Conseil d’État (Council of State, Belgium) decided to refer questions to the Court of Justice asking whether there were any exceptions to that option.

The Court, sitting as a Grand Chamber, found that the Procedures Directive, 3 read in the light of Article 7 and Article 24(2) of the Charter, does not preclude a Member State from exercising that option on the ground that the applicant has already been granted refugee status by another Member State, where that applicant is the father of a child who is an unaccompanied minor who has been granted subsidiary protection in the first Member State, without prejudice, nevertheless, to the application of Article 23(2) of the Qualification Directive, 4 which concerns maintaining family unity.