Facts
The complainant, a Serbian citizen, entered Switzerland in 1991 and received a settlement permit in 2002. He filed an application for family reunification for his daughter in 2004, which was rejected by the cantonal authorities. The complainant appealed this decision to the Administrative Court of the Canton of St. Gallen, which dismissed the appeal.
The complainant then filed an appeal with the Federal Court, requesting that the judgment of the Administrative Court be set aside and family reunification be granted for his daughter. The Federal Court dismissed the appeal, as the complainant had asserted the claim for reunification of his daughter under Art. 17 para. 2 sentence 3 RSFNA in an abusive manner.
Considerations
The Federal Court examined the contested decision only to the extent that the complainant could assert a fundamental claim for authorization. It found that the complainant had been in possession of a settlement permit since May 2002 and that a fundamental claim for inclusion of his daughter in the settlement permit therefore existed.
However, the court investigated whether the application for family reunification was to be considered abusive. It found that the complainant had only filed the application when his daughter was over 17 years old, although reunification would have been legally possible earlier. The court saw this as an indication of abuse of law, as the complainant could not plausibly explain why he had waited so long to exercise his right to reunification.
The court also pointed out that the complainant had cited a new, unconvincing…