Advance unedited version CCPR/C/129/D/3106/2018-3122/2018 agreement whereby the Angolan authorities authorized the school to reopen and the teachers to continue working until the new school administration could find international replacements. However, by February 2017 the authors requested international protection from the UNHCR in Luanda. Due to the suspension of the government asylum procedures and the high risk of refoulement, protection letters were issued to them and their families, and also transmitted to the Government of Angola. 2.7 However, the pressure continued for the authors to leave the country. In May 2017, they were requested by the new Angolan director of the school to organize their departure, according to instructions given by the Angolan Migration and Foreigners Service (SME). The Turkish asylum-seekers were divided into groups and a list was prepared, indicating which families or individuals should depart first. 2.8 Despite the issuance of protection letters and several meetings by the former UNHCR Representative and former Acting Representative for Angola, the State party maintained its position that the Turkish asylum-seekers were to abide by the Presidential Decree without having their asylum claims assessed. The Presidential Decree referred to State security as the reason for the expulsion of the Turkish teachers and their families. However, the Turkish teachers were not presented with any charges or any allegations. Conversely, the State party has kept them in a precarious situation, allowing them to work for the school, albeit still maintaining in place the Presidential Decree ordering them to leave the country. As a result, the authors are in a legal limbo, unable to access the asylum procedures in Angola and also unable to legally remain in the country because the State party has not renewed their work visas, while they face a permanent threat of refoulement. 2.9 The status and treatment of asylum-seekers and refugees in Angola is governed by the Right of Asylum and Refugee Status Act – Law 10/15 – adopted on 17 June 2015. The law provides that asylum-seekers’ cases should be transmitted to the National Council for Refugees (NCR). However, almost two years after the adoption of Law 10/15, the NCR is yet to be created. As reported by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants on his mission to Angola, “since the promulgation of the new Asylum Law No. 10/15 of June 2015, the previous system for refugee status determination has been discontinued. The regulation necessary for the establishment of a new refugee status determination system has yet to be adopted. The resulting legal gap has existed since June 2015 and is extremely prejudicial to asylum seekers, who are provided with no alternative status and no documentation.”7 Therefore, since the adoption of the new law, no asylum-seekers have had their claims assessed. As such, despite being asylum-seekers who fear returning to Turkey due to a fear of being persecuted and subjected to torture or other inhumane or cruel treatment, the authors and their families cannot resort to the Angolan asylum-system for protection. 2.10 Moreover, the unwarranted, lengthy delay in the implementation of the Asylum Law No. 10/15 has prevented asylum-seekers and refugees, including children, from accessing services such as education and healthcare. Furthermore, the indefinite halt in the issuing of identification documents for asylum-seekers and refugees has exacerbated the socioeconomic challenges that they face in Angola. Additionally, as Asylum Law 10/15 has not been implemented, even individuals who fall within the family reunification criteria cannot be recognized as refugees. The inevitable result is that the lack of government identification documents puts asylum-seekers and refugees at risk of refoulement, in contravention of article 33 of the 1951 Refugee Convention, since they have no proof that they are seeking asylum in Angola. Although Asylum Law 10/15 is not yet in force, article 29 (4) of the Law on the Legal Regime of Foreign Citizens already provides safeguards against the expulsion of refugees to countries where they might be persecuted for political, racial or religious reasons, or where their lives might be in danger. 8 7 8 4 Report of the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants on his mission to Angola, 25 April 2017, A/HRC/35/25/Add.1, para. 41. Report of the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants on his mission to Angola, para. 33.