A dual citizen of Italy and Ethiopia who brought her two Italian children to Canada more than a decade back, using aliases and falsely claiming they were Eritrean citizens subject to religious persecution, has won another chance for her family to stay here.

The Refugee Protection Division, which weighs refugee claims in Canada, initially accepted the 2014 claims of Tsegereda Tsegaye Wigebral and her two kids, Nobel and Melody Esayas Fisihatsion, now 19 and 17 respectively. But it nullified their refugee status and rejected their claim in December 2022 after learning their story was fake.

That same month, the family was declared inadmissible to Canada. They were ordered deported in August 2023, but applied for a pre-removal risk assessment, their last-ditch bid to stay here.

Last April, a senior immigration officer “reviewed the applicants’ file and held that they were not at risk of persecution, or subject to a danger of torture, and nor did they face a risk to their lives or a cruel or unusual punishment if they were removed to Italy,” according to a recent Federal Court decision out of Ottawa.

“While the applicants had alleged that they faced serious discrimination, social exclusion and abuse there, due to their race, and had alleged that they could not rely on the police or authorities for protection, the officer determined that there was not sufficient evidence before them to substantiate those claims,” wrote Justice Darren Thorne.

The officer “accepted that the applicants may have been subjected to ‘less favourable treatment’ due to their race, but found they had failed to establish that this rose to the level of persecution,” said Thorne’s decision, dated June 25. “In one of the central findings, the officer noted, in relation to mistreatment in Italy, that the principal applicant had provided ‘little to no further elaboration or evidence as to how she came to the conclusion that the Italian authorities would not help her.’”

The trouble is, immigration officials had asked the older child, who had turned 18, to file his own application, but the immigration officer handling their case didn’t look at what Nobel submitted before making a decision. Thorne said the immigration officer’s decision was “clearly” made without viewing the totality of the family’s applications.

“The right to be heard is among the most basic aspects of procedural fairness. When a decision has clearly been made without considering all of the materials submitted by an applicant, this right has been compromised,” said Thorne, who sent the family’s case back to a different immigration officer to re-evaluate.

A lawyer representing Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, who was fighting for the family’s removal, couldn’t explain why that happened, although they noted the officer may not have seen Nobel’s application.

The same lawyer argued Nobel’s submissions “were immaterial, as they contained broadly the same information as had been provided by the principal applicant,” and that the information he provided “also did not establish that the treatment suffered by the applicants rose to the level of persecution, so it would not have changed the officer’s decision, even if it had been considered.”

The judge did not find that argument persuasive.

“This supposition is pure speculation, and no evidence was put forth in support of it,” Thorne said. “It makes little difference whether the officer had missed, disregarded or somehow failed to have personally received the second (pre-removal risk assessment) application. The point is that the decision clearly did not involve consideration of this information from the applicants.”

Thorne concluded that the officer either didn’t know that there was a second application or “completely ignored” it. Either way, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada had specifically requested the information, so the officer should have addressed why Nobel’s application had been disregarded, if indeed it was dismissed purposefully.

The judge noted that Nobel’s application contained more details about what his family would face in Italy that were relevant, including the racism and discrimination “that is allowed or encouraged by political leaders in Italy.”

“Such evidence would seem directly pertinent to findings in the decision that the applicants had not provided elaboration or evidence in support of their beliefs that state authorities could not be relied upon for protection,” Thorne wrote.

The judge didn’t buy the argument that, even if the officer had looked at Nobel’s submissions, it “would not have led to the conclusion that the malign treatment allegedly suffered by the applicants rose to the level of persecution.”

“It is certainly possible that this belief is correct, and that this might well have been the determination of the officer, but it is not the role of this court to speculate on what the findings of the officer would have been, had they considered the information in the second (pre-removal risk assessment) application. It is unknowable what impact this would have had on the decision,” Thorne said.

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There is a growing backlash after the RCMP announced this month it is investigating whether Canadian citizens involved with clashes in or around Israel were in contravention of this country’s Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act.

Amid outcry from Jewish groups, the force said it wasn’t a criminal probe, but to “collect, preserve and assess information” for potential future prosecutions.

Foreign governments, such as Belgium and Brazil, have also opened investigations into their own citizens who served with the Israel Defense Forces.

Lt.-Col. (ret.) Maurice Hirsch, director of the Initiative for Palestinian Authority Accountability and Reform, at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, suggests these are politically motivated probes.

He has been retained by IDF soldiers who have been questioned by foreign government representatives. Hirsch has previously served as senior legal analyst for Human Rights Voices in New York, lawyer for the Israel Defense Forces, director of the legal department for Palestinian Media Watch, senior military consultant for NGO Monitor, and adviser to the Israeli Ministry of Defense.

Dave Gordon interviewed Hirsch for the National Post.

What do you think motivates foreign governments who seek these investigations?

I can’t tell you exactly as to what their motivation is, but I believe that it’s somewhere in the realms of political expediency, and internal demographic politics. It requires these governments to almost change what they’ve been doing traditionally, even to the point of potentially abandoning allies.

Their voter base has changed. And so now you have a situation where you need to almost pander, to cater, to a more fringe population.

In May, U.K. government lawyers told the High Court that there was no evidence Israel was deliberately targeting civilians in Gaza, and that evidence exists of Israel making efforts to limit harm to civilians. If the government doesn’t believe that war crimes are being committed, then obviously they won’t then take that forward, and actively engage in an investigation of something that they don’t believe is happening.

But if the government is so prejudiced, and predisposed, that war crimes are being committed, then obviously you launch an investigation.

What evidence would a foreign investigation need, to theoretically try a soldier in court?

Video footage, forensic analysis, operational logs — all impartially examined. What they have is so weak and poor, it’s impossible to say it’s “evidence.” I think it’s just so circumstantial and flimsy, even imagined.

Organizations are gathering information from social media, when IDF soldiers put up videos of their activities in the Gaza Strip, and those videos are predominantly taken out of context and given a criminal shade.

They’ll destroy a civilian building, which is a war crime, but clearly not if it’s a military target. For example, a place where weapons were stored, where terrorists were encamped, that had tunnels going underneath it. All of these possible scenarios.

And so the video itself shows absolutely nothing.

Governments are looking at reports and statements from people who have left Gaza, and can say anything they want. This whole effort, really, is a huge waste of time, resources and energy. It’s entirely impotent, because without knowing exactly what the military goal was in any given circumstance, there’s no way you can actually assess the actions of the soldier.

There’s a legal mechanism that already exists in Israel, to prosecute soldiers who have broken laws?

Without question. There is an entire investigative process. Everyone knows they exist. And yet this almost sanctimonious drive, seems to be to ignore that reality, and pushes for these

 
ad hoc

 courts to somehow take charge.

In media interviews, you contend that there is no formal support from the Israeli government for IDF (soldiers), to defend them against foreign investigations. Is that still the case?

That still appears to be the case. There are certain ministries that are involved in a risk assessment, and are there to help, I think, the higher ranking officers. But my experience till now has been that the lower ranking soldiers find it very, very difficult to get any support whatsoever from these ministries, and that I fear is very dangerous.

Of these Israeli departments which you criticize, are they aware of the shortcomings you speak of?

So the difficulty is, that they don’t know even the extent of the exposure that the soldiers are facing, and wouldn’t know necessarily to be able to provide assistance to everyone in need. You’re talking about potentially hundreds of thousands of people.

This is just a question of personnel and manpower. It’s overwhelming right now, especially where we’re busy fighting a war.

On a government-to-government level, how is this issue being dealt with?

There are discussions on all different types of levels, and without again getting into too much detail, I think in many cases, a lot of the work is being done diplomatically.

The opening of an investigation is dependent on a government decision, rather than anyone presenting to a court with alleged evidence. That’s already a very big step forward than what used to be the case in England, where any organization could claim that X had committed war crimes, submit any type of evidence they had to a local magistrate, and that magistrate could then issue an arrest warrant.

With predominantly friendly governments, the hope is that they can be diplomatically persuaded, or dissuaded, from going down a certain path.

Which steps should the Israeli government take to address these investigations?

I think it needs to be a conglomerate of different actors, because the problem requires different solutions and different involvement.

I would suggest a joint task force of the Justice Ministry, the Foreign Ministry, the Defense Ministry, each one contributing in their own unique way to providing the best support possible.

And sometimes the support needed is relatively simple, just to say that that X person was not in active duty in any type of a position, that could be considered relevant, when the alleged war crimes happen.

This interview has been edited for brevity.

(National Post contacted the IDF spokesperson’s unit and the spokesperson for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and received no response.)

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A B.C. firefighter says he was denied entry into the United States, where he was going to take part in a competition for First Responders from different countries around the world.

Jamie Flynn posted on social media on Thursday to detail what happened to him when he was en route to Birmingham, Alabama. He said he was supposed to represent Vancouver firefighters in the Jiu Jitsu category at the

World Police & Fire Games

. He described the games as an “international event uniting frontline responders through sport,” in a post on Instagram.

“Being denied entry to the United States is deeply upsetting,” he told National Post in an emailed statement on Friday.

“I lost my flights, my time away, and my opportunity to compete at the World Police & Fire Games in Alabama — an event I had trained extensively for.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jamie Flynn (@jamieflynnbase)

Flynn said he is a British citizen living in Canada as a permanent resident.

He is a firefighter in Vancouver and volunteers with Squamish Search and Rescue. He has served in the British Parachute Regiment (SFSG) and has also served alongside U.S. forces under Joint Special Operations Command.

“I operated under U.S. command, wore the American uniform, and fought under the American flag. I’ve always felt a strong bond with the United States,” he told National Post. “I have no criminal record and no known issues that would justify this denial.”

In his post on Instagram, he said he trained for the competition in the U.S. for months. “And still, I’m grounded — sidelined not by injury or lack of effort, but by bureaucracy and silence,” he wrote.

Flynn intended to fly to Alabama from Vancouver International Airport on Wednesday. He never made his flight because his Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) had expired and would not be renewed,

Global News reported

. He said he received an update on the ESTA app that said, “Travel not authorized.”

ESTA is an automated system used to determine the eligibility of visitors to travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It is valid for two years, or until a passport expires, and allows for multiple entries.

If a traveller receives a “travel not authorized” response to their application, CBP says online that they can look into applying for a visa if they still wish to enter the country. The denial only prohibits travel under the Visa Waiver Program and does not determine eligibility for a visa, per the agency.

Canadian citizens travelling with a Canadian passport

do not need to apply for an ESTA

.

Flynn said that he did not receive an explanation from anyone at the U.S. border, the U.S. consulate or the ESTA program.

“This feels like a clerical error,” he said, and, he added, it’s cost him thousands of dollars. “I’m gutted. I’m angry. And I want answers.”

He ended the post with the line: “We were good enough to fight their wars — but not good enough to cross their borders.”

Flynn told National Post that he is looking forward to being able to visit the U.S. again in the near future. He has since submitted a visa application.

Unfortunately, he said, the earliest available appointment is Feb. 11, 2027.

University of Toronto law professor and Rebecca Cook Chair in Human Rights Law Audrey Macklin

said her advice for travellers going to the U.S. is to avoid it altogether “unless absolutely necessary.”

“Even at the best of times, states often treat non-citizens arbitrarily, and do not feel obliged to explain their actions,” she told National Post over email.

“This is sometimes justified on the ground that non-citizens do not have a right to enter, and therefore have no standing to complain about how a decision to admit or exclude is made. Since the rule of law is in free fall in the United States at the moment, the arbitrariness is more extreme, more coercive, and more frequent. That is why travellers should avoid the United States if they can.”

National Post has reached out to U.S. Customs and Border Protection for comment.

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