A-547-80
Mahmoud Saddo (Petitioner)
v.
Immigration Appeal Board, F. Glogowski, R.
Tremblay and G. Loiselle (Respondents)
and
Minister of Canada Employment and Immigration
and Deputy Attorney General of Canada (Mis -en-
cause)
Court of Appeal, Pratte and Le Dain JJ., Hyde
D.J.—Montreal, January 19, 1981.
Judicial review — Immigration — Application.to set aside
Immigration Appeal Board's decision that applicant is not a
Convention refugee — Refusal by Board to consider newspaper
articles as evidence of persecution — Whether Board erred in
law — Application allowed — Federal Court Act, R.S.C. 1970
(2nd Supp.), c. 10, s. 28 — Immigration Act, 1976, S.C.
1976-77, c. 52, s. 71.
APPLICATION for judicial review.
COUNSEL:
Julius H. Grey for petitioner.
Suzanne Marcoux-Paquette for respondents
and mis -en-cause.
SOLICITORS:
Julius H. Grey, Montreal, for petitioner.
Deputy Attorney General of Canada for
respondents and mis -en-cause.
The following are the reasons for judgment of
the Court delivered orally in English by
PRATTE J.: This is a section 28 application to set
aside a decision of the Immigration Appeal Board
under subsection 71(1) of the Immigration Act,
1976, S.C. 1976-77, c. 52, determining that the
applicant is not a Convention refugee.
The applicant had submitted newspaper articles
in support of his contention that the members of
the tribe to which he belonged were persecuted by
the Ethiopian authorities. The Board refused to
consider those articles on the ground that "the
Board cannot consider newspaper articles as evi
dence on which it can base its decision." This
statement, in our view, discloses an error of law.
Newspaper articles may or may not have probative
value according to the circumstances of each case.
They may afford reasonable grounds to believe
that a refugee claim could be established upon a
hearing of the application; they may also be an
element in establishing a well-founded fear of per
secution. For those reasons, they had to be con
sidered and weighed by the Board in making a
decision under section 71.
For those reasons, the application will be
allowed, the decision under attack will be set aside
and the matter will be referred back to the Board
for disposition on the basis that the newspaper
articles submitted by the applicant must be con
sidered and weighed by the Board in reaching its
decision.
You are being directed to the most recent version of the statute which may not be the version considered at the time of the judgment.