A US Federal Appeals Court has ruled that a Monterey County man and his family who fled Fiji in 1998 in response to racially motivated beatings and death threats are eligible for political asylum.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported that the Ninth US Circuit of Appeals in San Francisco reversed rulings by immigration courts against Rajeshwar Singh of Seasside, his wife Mohini Lata Singh and their two children.

The Singhs told the US courts that they had suffered violence at the hands of Fiji's native majority, who control the government.

The court was told that Rajeshwar Singh's father was killed in a racially motivated beating in 1987, and the Singhs were under pressure to vacate their leased land.

The court said Singh, a cab driver, was locked in the trunk of his taxi in 1996 by passengers who then rolled the vehicle into a ditch, seriously injuring him.

The court said Singh's wife and one of his young sons were also attacked.

A Federal Immigration board had earlier ruled that the Singhs had not been persecuted and therefore were ineligible for asylum because they failed to show that the police were unable or unwilling to protect them.

But the court in a 3-0 ruling has now said that Singh had complained to the police about the violence and had gotten no response.

The court said they had previously recognized the indifference of authorities to violence against Indo Fijians during the period at issue in the case.

They said the Singhs had been persecuted because of their ethnicity, and probably would be persecuted again if they were deported.