Denmark does not participate in the EU Qualification Directive 2004/83/EC, but Denmark is a party to the European Convention on Human Rights as well as the Geneva Convention of 1951 and the Protocol of 1967. Denmark’s asylum law does not recognize sexual orientation as a particular social group eligible for refugee status. However Denmark will grant a residence permit to an LGBT applicant who faces death or torture (including inhuman and degrading treatment) if returned to their home country . For example, the Danish Refugee Appeals Board gave a resident permit to a homosexual male applicant from Iran solely on the basis that he risked assault from his father and his boyfriend’s brothers if he returned to Iran. The Danish LGBT organisation LGBT Denmark and the Danish Refugee Council have published in 2009 a study (“Disturbing Knowledge”) on decisions from asylum cases as documentation of persecution of LGBT-persons, showing that decisions vary a great deal depending on the countries of origin.

Another challenge facing LGBT applicants is that private acts of violence against LGBT persons are generally seen as crimes, not persecution .

LGBT applicants also encounter difficulty in being considered credible, and difficult living conditions in asylum centers .

Same-sex unmarried partners are accepted on the same grounds as oppositesex unmarried partners—they must be cohabiting partners .

General on asylum in an EU member state

Under Council Directive 2004/83/EC, Apr. 29, 2004 (the “Qualification Directive” or “Directive”) sexual orientation may, depending on the circumstances of the country of origin, provide the basis for a claim for asylum based on persecution based on membership of a particular social group. As of 2008, no Member “ha[d] explicitly refused to consider sexual orientation as a source of persecution for the purposes of granting refugee status.” As of 2009, there was data available to confirm (page 84) that “asylum ha[d] been granted to LGBT persons in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Czech Republic and the United Kingdom. The asylum policies of the countries discussed here (page 96) must also all conform to the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Optional Protocol, as well as the European Charter of Human Rights. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has made it clear that LGBT individuals are members of a particular social group. The Council of Europe concurs in this interpretation. According to the Treaty on the functioning of the European Union’s Protocol on asylum for nationals of Member States of the European Union, Member States of the EU shall be regarded as constituting safe countries of origin in respect of each other for all legal and practical purposes in relation to asylum matters . Accordingly, any application for asylum made by a national of a Member State are normally not taken into consideration.