The thesis addresses subsidiary protection, a form of international protection in the European Union. Subsidiary protection was incorporated in the EU law on the basis of EU member states practices, complementing the protection granted by the 1951 Refugee Convention. Subsidiary protection beneficiaries enjoy fewer rights than persons with refugee status. Interpretation of the legal construct is often challenging due to very limited basis for interpretation in the Directive, travaux préparatoires and CJEU case-law. That, consequently, leads to different applications of subsidiary protection among member states. The first part of the thesis consists of a brief introduction of subsidiary protection. The second part is focused on the identification of the elements of subsidiary protection definition, which are causing major difficulties in interpretation. Interpretational guidelines supported by the CJEU, ECtHR and Slovenian courts case-law are provided for each of the elements. The third part of the thesis illustrates that different regulations of refugee status and subsidiary protection status, which grants a shorter duration of the protection and limited access to social welfare to the beneficiaries, is not necessary and objectively justified. The thesis is concluded with critical observations on the intended Common European Asylum System reform and expected adoption of the Qualification Regulation. The proposal of the Qualification Regulation neither offers a more solid basis for interpretation of subsidiary protection nor solves the issue of different treatment of refugees and persons with subsidiary protection status.
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