Docket: IMM-24172-24
Citation: 2026 FC 751
Toronto, Ontario, June 8, 2026
PRESENT: The Honourable Justice Battista
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BETWEEN:
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SHANTI GHALE
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Applicant
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and
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THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP
AND IMMIGRATION
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Respondent
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REASONS AND JUDGMENT
I. Overview
[1] After being determined to be a Convention refugee, the Applicant returned to her country of citizenship for one week to visit her ill mother. The Refugee Protection Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board (RPD) subsequently determined that she did not rebut the presumption that she reavailed herself of her country’s protection, and it cessated her refugee status.
[2] For the reasons that follow, the RPD’s decision is unreasonable and the application for judicial review is granted. The RPD made an unreasonable general adverse finding of credibility against the Applicant, then based key parts of its subsequent analysis on this unreasonable finding.
II. Background
[3] The Applicant is a citizen of Nepal who was recognized as a Convention refugee based on her fears of Biplav Maoist cadres, who are non-state actors. In recognizing her claim to refugee protection, an RPD panel accepted her evidence that she and her family were harassed and extorted, and that she was kidnapped and raped after her husband fled from Nepal.
[4] The Applicant travelled to India to visit her half-brother shortly after becoming a permanent resident in 2019. While she was in India, she learned that her mother was ill and hospitalized in Nepal. She travelled to Nepal for one week to visit her mother then returned to India and eventually to Canada.
[5] Upon her arrival in Canada, the Applicant was questioned at the airport by an Officer of the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). Partial notes from this examination were subsequently produced at the RPD cessation hearing. The CBSA examination notes are less than two pages and contain a narrative of the interview combined with what purports to be a verbatim record of five questions posed by a CBSA Officer with responses from the Applicant. The notes indicate that the Applicant initially denied travelling to Nepal.
[6] A panel of the RPD allowed the application for cessation of the Applicant’s refugee status finding that she did not rebut the presumption that she reavailed herself of Nepal’s protection (Canada (Citizenship and Immigration) v Galindo Camayo, 2022 FCA 50 [Galindo Camayo] at paras 63-65).
[7] The RPD drew a general adverse credibility finding against the Applicant using the CBSA examination notes that recorded her denial that she visited Nepal. The RPD acknowledged that the notes did not reflect a complete record of the interaction between the Applicant and the CBSA, but rejected the Applicant’s explanations that at the interview she struggled to understand the Officer due to her poor English, that she was not offered an interpreter, and that she was nervous.
III. Issue
[8] The sole issue in this application is whether the RPD’s decision was reasonable pursuant to the description of that standard by the Supreme Court of Canada in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65 at paragraph 99 [Vavilov]. A reasonable decision is respectful of the legal and factual constraints bearing on the case, and is based on coherent reasoning (Vavilov, at para 101).
IV. Analysis
[9] The Applicant challenges the RPD’s decision on the following bases:
- The RPD failed to consider, and base the reavailment analysis on, the fact that the Applicant’s fear related to non-state agents,
- The RPD erred in interpreting and applying reavailment,
- Procedural fairness was breached because the Applicant was not advised that the purpose of the CBSA airport examination was to assess whether cessation proceedings should be initiated.
[10] The parties also made submissions on the reasonableness of the RPD’s general adverse credibility finding against the Applicant. In my view, the RPD’s assessment of the Applicant’s credibility was not reasonable and this error resulted in an unreasonable finding regarding the Applicant’s subjective knowledge of the immigration consequences of her travel.
A. The unreasonableness of the RPD’s determination that the Applicant was “not generally credible”
[11] The RPD’s credibility assessment of the Applicant was not justified for multiple reasons.
[12] First, the RPD referred to the Applicant’s “history of misrepresenting information to immigration authorities”
but only identified one incident of alleged misrepresentation, which was based on summary notes made by a CBSA agent after the Applicant’s arrival in Canada from her trips to India and Nepal. The reference to the Applicant’s history of misrepresentation to immigration authorities is not explained, and it is not transparent (Vavilov, at paras 102-103).
[13] Second, assuming that the Applicant’s misrepresentation “history”
consisted solely of this singular incident reflected in the CBSA notes, the RPD failed to explain how a single incident of untruthfulness led to a determination that the Applicant was not generally credible — particularly when the RPD found a significant amount of her other evidence to be credible.
[14] Decision-makers may find witnesses to be generally lacking in credibility without disbelieving all evidence they provide (Sheikh v Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration), 1990 CanLII 13057 (FCA), [1990] 3 FC 238 at 244; Tameh v Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration), 2003 FC 1468 at paras 27-28), and general adverse credibility assessments can be made based on a singular, serious adverse finding which impacts the overall credibility of a witness (Gaprindashvili v Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2019 FC 583 at paras 23-25).
[15] However, findings that a witness is not generally credible must be clearly explained in order to meet the hallmarks of justification, transparency, and intelligibility (Dayanidiy v Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2025 FC 1019). Such findings must also be made after all central evidence is considered, including evidence which is found to be credible (Iqbal v Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration), 2006 FC 1219 at para 8). In my view, the obligation to explain a finding that a witness is not generally credible rises with the volume of a witness’s evidence that is found to be credible.
[16] The RPD found the following evidence of the Applicant to be credible:
˗ the Applicant’s testimony regarding her motivation to return to Nepal, which the RPD agreed was a “compelling” motivation, supported by medical documents she provided;
˗ the Applicant’s testimony regarding her relationship to her half-brother, and his residence in India, supported by her half-brother’s identity documents;
˗ the Applicant’s motivation to travel to India, which was to visit her family;
˗ the Applicant’s testimony about her travel in Nepal and India, including the fact that she only stayed one week in Nepal, supported by bus tickets and hotel receipts as evidence;
˗ the Applicant’s testimony that the reasons for her fears of persecution in Nepal continued to exist at the time of her travel.
[17] The RPD also had initial credibility concerns related to the Applicant’s documentary evidence but stated that its concerns were alleviated, and the documentary evidence was found to be reliable.
[18] The RPD’s conclusion that the Applicant was not generally credible does not correspond with the acceptance of this credible and relevant evidence, which renders the conclusion unreasonable (Vavilov, at para 102-103).
[19] Finally, the RPD’s credibility assessment was unreasonable due to its incoherent use of the CBSA interview notes. The RPD used evidentiary gaps in the CBSA notes against the Applicant without explaining why those gaps could not also plausibly be resolved in the Applicant’s favour.
[20] The Applicant explained the misrepresentation concerns arising from the record of her statements to CBSA by highlighting her poor English, and by stating that she was nervous at the examination.
[21] The RPD acknowledged that the CBSA notes were only a summary of the examination at the border, yet rejected the Applicant’s explanations due to the lack of evidence in the notes that the Applicant failed to understand the CBSA Officer, or was nervous. The RPD concluded that the incomplete CBSA notes were “insufficient to conclude that the CBSA did not ask the [Applicant] if she understood English or needed an interpreter.”
It also stated that there is no indication in the incomplete notes that the Applicant “flagged any concerns”
about her ability to communicate in English.
[22] In fact, the interview notes indicate that the Applicant responded with “significant hesitation,”
which could plausibly have been an indication of her weak English fluency or her nervousness.
[23] This Court has recognized that interview notes from port of entry examinations have limited reliability due to the conditions under which they are taken (I.P.P. v Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2018 FC 123 at para 134). Far from approaching the CBSA notes from the Applicant’s interview with caution, the RPD acknowledged that the notes were incomplete but used them to reject the Applicant’s explanations and impugn her overall credibility. The RPD’s finding that the evidentiary gaps in the interview notes should be filled with an assumption against the Applicant’s explanations and credibility was not justified and therefore unreasonable.
B. The RPD’s unreasonable credibility assessment rendered its application of the factors to rebut the presumption of reavailment unreasonable
[24] The RPD’s unreasonable credibility assessment led to an unreasonable application of the factors used to assess whether the Applicant rebutted the presumption of reavailment (Galindo Camayo at para 84).
[25] First, the RPD used the CBSA port of entry notes to determine that the Applicant did not have a subjective fear of persecution in Nepal. Because the notes were not treated reasonably, the RPD’s finding that the Applicant lacked a subjective fear finding is unreasonable.
[26] More significantly, the RPD used its general adverse credibility finding against the Applicant to disbelieve her evidence that she was unaware of the immigration consequences of her travel. As explained above, the general adverse credibility finding was not reasonable, and it therefore could not be used to invalidate the Applicant’s testimony that she was unaware of the immigration consequences of her travel.
[27] A refugee’s understanding of the immigration consequences of their travel is “a key factual consideration”
in the determination of whether a refugee has rebutted the presumption of reavailment (Galindo Camayo, at para 70). The RPD’s unreasonable treatment of this factor, based on its unreasonable credibility assessment, renders the RPD’s cessation decision unreasonable.
V. Conclusion
[28] The RPD’s general adverse credibility finding was not justified, and its use of this flawed credibility finding to assess the factors relevant for rebutting the presumption renders the decision unreasonable. It is accordingly not necessary to assess the Applicant’s procedural fairness arguments.
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