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2019 RLLR 179

Citation: 2019 RLLR 179
Tribunal: Refugee Protection Division
Date of Decision: January 30, 2019
Panel: M. Moc
Counsel for the Claimant(s): M. Mary Akhbari
Country: Egypt
RPD Number: TB8-20690
Associated RPD Number(s): TB8-20691
ATIP Number: A-2020-00518
ATIP Pages: 000663-000669

REASONS FOR DECISION

[1]     These are the reasons for the decision in the claims of Ms. XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX (“the claimant”) and Ms. XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX (“the associate claimant”), who claim to be citizens of Egypt and are seeking refugee protection pursuant to section 96 and subsection 97(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA).1

[2]     As the claimants are common-law partners, their claims were joined pursuant to Rule 55 of the Refugee Protection Division Rules.2 The principal file number on record is TBS-20690.

EXPEDITED DETERMINATION

[3]     Paragraph 170(f) of IRPA3 provides that the Refugee Protection Division (RPD) may allow a claim for refugee protection without a hearing, unless the Minister has notified the RPD of the Minister’s intention to intervene within the time limit set out in the Refugee Protection Division Rules.4 Further, subsection 162(2) of IRPA5 directs each Division to deal with all proceedings before it as informally and quickly as the circumstances and the considerations of fairness and natural justice permit.

[4]     The claimant’s case was identified as one that could be processed through the RPD’s expedited process for Egyptian claims. The RPD received the claimant’s signed Certificate of Readiness6 for the expedited process on January 7, 2019. Having carefully considered the evidence in this case, the panel finds that it meets the criteria for expedited determination.

[5]     This case has therefore been decided without a hearing, according to the Policy on the Expedited Processing of Refugee Claims by the Refugee Protection Division.7

ALLEGATIONS

[6]     The following is a summary of the claimant’s allegations as outlined in the narrative to her Basis of Claim (BOC)8 form dated July 19, 2018.

[7]     The claimants are a young female couple who fear for their life on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in Egypt. The principal claimant describes growing up in Egypt and attending primary school in Saudi Arabia, and gradually coming to realize and understand her sexual orientation as a lesbian woman. In high school, the claimant began researching about the LGBTQ community online, and experienced her first romantic relationship with a classmate. In 2015, the claimant’s parents discovered phone messages from her lesbian friends, and forcibly had her admitted to hospital for treatment of mental illness. Upon release, the claimant’s daily activities continued to be monitored by her family. In October 2016, the claimant met her partner, the associate claimant, through social media, and the couple moved in together in September 2017.

[8]     The claimants observed the crackdown on the LGBTQ community by the Egyptian police, and attempted to secure travel visas to leave the country. As they moved from Cairo to Giza, they were at times stopped and questioned by the police, harassed by members of the public, and evicted from their apartment. Through Bedaya, an organization that assists LGBTQ individuals in Egypt, the claimants made contact with the Rainbow Railroad of Toronto, and attended interviews at the Canadian Embassy in Cairo. They left Egypt for Canada on XXXX XXXX XXXX 2018, filing their claims for refugee protection inland on August 24, 2018 in Toronto.

[9]     The claimants fear persecution and harm at the hands of homophobic persons, including state officials, on the basis of their sexual orientation in Egypt. They also allege that the authorities are unable or unwilling to protect them, as lesbian women, in Egypt.

DETERMINATION

[10]   The panel finds that the claimants are Convention refugees under section 96 of IRPA for the following reasons.

ANALYSIS

Identity—personal and national

[11]   The claimants’ identities as nationals of Egypt have been established, on a balance of probabilities, by two valid Arab Republic of Egypt passports9 that were seized by the referring IRCC (formerly CIC) office.

Identity—Sexual Orientation/Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE)

[12]   The claimants have also established their identities as lesbian women, including their personal identities as conjugal partners in a common-law relationship, by way of their extensive personal documentation, including but not limited to the following: supporting letters and correspondence addressed to the claimants from Rainbow Railroad and Bedaya; text messages between the claimants and their parents; rent receipts for the claimants’ apartment in Egypt; and various photographs.10

Credibility

[13]   The panel has reviewed the claimants’ Basis of Claim (BOC),11 intake forms,12 GCMS notes by the Cairo visa post officer,13 and the claimant-specific documents disclosed by counsel,14 and has found the claimants to be credible regarding the central elements in this case – namely that they are lesbian women who have previously been harassed and persecuted on the basis of their sexual orientation in Egypt.

[14]   In reviewing the National Documentation Package (NDP) for Egypt,15 the panel has found the claimants’ personal evidence to be consistent with the objective country conditions documents before it. As such, the panel finds that the claimants have established, on a balance of probabilities, their profile as lesbian women who have been targeted by Egyptian officials and homophobic individuals because of their sexual identity.

[15]   As gender identity falls within the membership of a particular social group category, and thus forms a basis for refugee claims, as per section 96 of IRPA, the test is whether there is a serious possibility of persecution should the claimants return to Egypt.

[16]   The panel finds, based on the evidence before it, that the claimants have met that test.

State protection

[17]   In order to establish a claim pursuant to section 96 of the IRPA, the claimant must rebut the presumption of state protection. The claimants did not seek protection from the authorities, as the state itself was the agent of persecution in this particular case, through its discriminatory legal and judicial apparatus when interacting with LGBTQ persons in Egypt.

[18]   The panel has before it country conditions documentation indicating that, even though same-sex relationships between consenting adults are not illegal, “the Law on the Combating of Prostitution, and the law against debauchery have been used liberally to imprison gay men in recent years.”16

[19]   The panel notes the following:

Public morality is recognised by international law as grounds for limiting expression … [and] individuals who, through their sexual or gender expression, disrupt conservative binary gender models are especially vulnerable in Egypt, according to an activist who was based in Egypt through recent years. Through 2015 and 2016, widely publicised arrests continue. …

According to 76 Crimes, the largest reported number of arrests of LGBT people has been in Egypt, where a crackdown has been under way since 2013 as part of a larger government effort to arrest and harass political opponents, human rights defenders and journalists. In late-2016, LGBT community leaders estimate that as many as 500 LGBT people have been sent to prison.17

[20]   Country documentation further states that

[a]fter a coup resulted in a new government in late 2013, the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) began documenting increased arrests and harassment of people perceived to be gay or transgender by the public morals police, with at least 77 arrests taking place between October 2013 and May 2014. Arrests continue at similar rates— many of them stemming from police efforts to entrap gay men by using social media.18 [citations omitted]

[21]   Country documentation confirms that LGBTQ persons continue to be targeted by Egyptian authorities through the state’s penal and legal apparatus. The panel finds that the objective documentary evidence before it supports the claimants’ allegations, and that they have provided clear and convincing evidence of the state’s inability to protect them as lesbian women. As such, the claimants have rebutted the presumption of state protection should they return to Egypt.

[22]   In noting that the state itself is the agent of persecution in this particular case, the panel also finds that there is not an area of the country where the claimants would be able to reside and safely participate in the community, and as such there is no internal flight alternative available to the claimants anywhere in Egypt.

[23]   Given the documentary evidence before the panel, both personal and objective, the panel finds that there is a serious possibility that the claimants could face persecution on the basis of their sexual identity should they return to Egypt, and that state protection would not reasonably be forthcoming to them anywhere in the country.

CONCLUSION

[24]   Based on the foregoing analysis, the panel has determined that the claimants have established that there is a serious possibility of persecution on a Convention ground as per section 96 of IRPA if they were to return to Egypt.

[25]   The panel therefore finds that the claimants are Convention refugees and accepts the claims.

(signed)       M. MOC   

January 30, 2019

Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, S.C. 2001, c. 27, as amended.

Refugee Protection Division Rules (SOR/2012-256).

Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, S.C. 2001, c. 27, as amended, section 170(f).

Refugee Protection Division Rules (SOR/2012-256).

Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, S.C. 2001, c. 27, as amended, section 162(2).

6 Exhibit 5.

7 Policy on the Expedited Processing of Refugee Claims by the Refugee Protection Division, effective September 18, 2015.

8  Exhibit 2, principal claimant’s BOC, RPD file number TB8-20690.

9 Exhibit 1, package of information from the referring CBSA/CIC.

10 Exhibit 6, personal documentation #1.

11 Exhibits 2 and 3.

12 Exhibit 1, package of information from the referring CBSA/CIC.

13 Ibid., see GCMS notes.

14 Exhibits 6 and 7.

15 Exhibit 4, National Documentation Package, Egypt, 29 June 2018.

16 Ibid., tab 6.1: Egypt. State-Sponsored Homophobia. A world survey of sexual orientation laws: criminalisation, protection and recognition. International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association. Aengus Carroll; Lucas Ramon Mendos. May 2017.

17 Ibid.

18 Ibid., tab 6.2: Egypt. Dignity Debased: Forced Anal Examinations in Homosexuality Prosecutions. Human Rights Watch. 12 July 2016.