What are the reasons one can claim refugee protection for?
A Convention refugee means that the claimant has a well-founded fear of persecution. There are five grounds of persecution, recognized by the international community: race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group and political opinion. When someone claims refugee status, there must be a relation between the fear of persecution and one of the five grounds as enumerated above. When claiming refugee status, one can identify the grounds or not. It will be up to the Refugee Division of the IRB (Immigration and Refugee Board) to determine whether the grounds referred to is genuine or not or whether there are other grounds of persecution. The claimants are required to fill out the Personal Information Form (PIF) where they have to give all the details about their background, their family’s background in terms of education, work history, addresses, etc. and, most of all, the ground for their claim with details. The claimants must bring forward all the documentary support
