THREE children and their father have been left in an Ethiopian refugee camp for the last three years because the Department of Justice apparently failed to inform them that they had been granted permission to move to Ireland.
The department has in recent days issued visas to the four individuals.
But this is only after the children's mother, who has refugee status here, took High Court proceedings against the department.
The court heard yesterday that the children's mother was never told that the department had in August 2005 approved her application for her husband and children to reside with her in Ireland. She only learned of the decision late last year when she obtained her file under the Freedom of Information Act.
The 30-year-old mother said she had finally been told by a Department official last month that the visas would be sent to the Irish Embassy in Addis Ababa for her family to collect, but when her husband and three children went to the embassy, they were told it had received no communication from the department and there were no visas.
She then initiated her High Court action for orders requiring the visas to be issued and for damages, including aggravated and exemplary damages, for breaches of her rights, including to family reunification.
Immigrant groups are critical of the Government's family reunification procedures, which they say are unclear and laborious.
It takes some 24 months for an application to be processed and there is a backlog of 2,000 cases. Five individuals - including two part-time staff - are employed in the department's reunification unit.
The department argues that processing times are long because applicants often do not submit the correct documentation in the first instance, while their authenticity in some cases needs to be verified by gardaí.
In an affidavit the woman at the centre of the High Court case said: "I have been very distressed by being apart from my husband and children knowing they are at risk where they are and am extremely upset at the time it has taken to secure visas . . . to enable them to travel to Ireland to join me. The time apart from them can never be replaced. I have lost three years with my children as they grow up."
The family are Somalian and the mother fled from there to Ireland in late 2003. She secured refugee status in August 2004 and applied to the minister for justice in late 2004 for permission for her family to join her. While a spokeswoman for the department said it would not comment on the case because it is before the courts, The Irish Timesunderstands that visas have been issued to the father and three children in recent days.
The court heard yesterday that because she was unaware of letters drafted by the department in August 2005 stating that it would grant the visas, the mother continued to presume during 2005, 2006 and 2007 that her application was still being processed.
She wrote on several occasions to the department in an unsuccessful bid to find out what was happening to it. The delay was "very upsetting" for her and she wrote to the department of her anxiety.
She said she did not receive a reply to letters but was aware the department had received them because they were on its file of her case.
She had hired solicitors, who in late 2007 obtained that file under the Freedom of Information Act, the department having initially refused to release it.
Mr Justice John Hedigan ordered last week that the department should explain matters to the court. When the case was mentioned this week to Ms Justice Mary Finlay Geoghegan, counsel for the department said the visas would be reissued and it was expected this would resolve matters. The case was returned to tomorrow, when the court will be updated on progress.