CEDAW/C/GC/32 (c) That women asylum seekers have access to competent legal representation in advance of the initial asylum interview. Where necessary, they should be afforded legal assistance free of charge. Unaccompanied and separated girls must in all cases be assigned a qualified legal representative and a guardian to assist them through the asylum procedure and ensure respect for their best interests; 49 (d) That interviewers use techniques and procedures that are sensitive to gender, age and other intersectional grounds of discrimination and disadvantage that compound the human rights violations that women refugees and asylum seekers experience; (e) That a supportive interview environment is established so that the claimant can provide her account, including disclosure of sensitive and personal information, especially for survivors of trauma, torture and/or ill-treatment and sexual violence, and that sufficient time is allocated for interviews; (f) That childcare is made available during the interviews so that the claimant does not have to present her claim, involving sensitive information, in front of her children; (g) That, while the woman asylum claimant normally bears the burden of proving her asylum case, the duty to ascertain and evaluate all the relevant facts is shared between the claimant and the examiner. The threshold for accepting asylum applications should be measured not against the probability but against the reasonable likelihood that the claimant has a well-founded fear of persecution or that she would be exposed to persecution on return; (h) That, in some cases, it may be for the examiner to use all the means at his or her disposal to produce the necessary evidence in support of the application, including by seeking and gathering gender-relevant information from reliable governmental and non-governmental sources on human rights in the country of origin; (i) That late disclosure by the claimant during the asylum procedure of sexual violence and other traumatic events does not automatically lead to an adverse judgement on her credibility. Reluctance to identify the true extent of the persecution suffered or feared may stem from feelings of shame, stigma or trauma. Statements regarding the confidential nature of interviews, including that information provided by the woman will not be shared with members of her family without her consent, should be standard practice; (j) That mechanisms for referral to psychosocial counselling and other support services, where necessary, both before and after the asylum interview, are made available; (k) That, should the application be rejected, the decision must be reasoned and the claimant should be able to appeal against it to a competent body; __________________ 49 16/21 See Committee on the Rights of the Child, general comment No. 6 on treatment of unaccompanied and separated children outside their country of origin, paras. 21, 33, 36 and 39; Executive Committee of the Programme of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, conclusion No. 107 (LVIII) on children at risk, para. (g) (viii). 14-64766