The Federal Court of Canada judge has given a former head constable in Pakistans notorious Punjab Police Service (PPS) another chance to remain in Canada under a refugee status after he had previously been set to be deported.Munir Ahmad Malhi came to Canada in 2020 alongside his wife and sought protection and refugee status due to his Ahmadiyya faith, which, due to persecution of members of that faith in Pakistan, allowed him and his wife to be granted refugee status.His former employer, the PPS, is notorious, not only being considered "the most corrupt police department in the province" but also having a long-standing reputation of torture, rape, revenge arrests, and killing of civilians.Canada's Immigration Minister at the time appealed the granting of refugee status due to Malhi's ties to the PPS. It was argued that Malhi "is excluded from refugee protection because he served with the PPS, which has committed crimes against humanity.".The appeal was allowed, and after a series of interviews and hearings with Canada Border Services and the Canadian Immigration Division (CID), in 2024 Malhi's refugee claim was suspended.After the hearing with the CID, it was determined that due to his longstanding history with the PPS, he would have been complicit in crimes against humanity."...the PPS has committed crimes against humanity and that (Malhi) was complicit in those crimes,” said CID during the 2024 hearing.During the hearing it was also noted that Mahli "did not dispute the minister’s generalized evidence about the PPS and acknowledged that the PPS’s propensity for violence is common knowledge in Pakistan. The CID relied on extensive objective evidence filed by the minister to find that the PPS engaged in systemic human rights abuses, including torture, rape, enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings. It concluded that these offences constitute crimes against humanity.”.Although the Immigration minister and CID acknowledged that Malhi himself wasn't "personally involved in committing crimes against humanity," his long association and high rank made him complicit.The decision was reached due to Malhi's "long tenure with the PPS, his promotion from constable to head constable, and the receipt of service awards throughout his career and concluded that there were reasonable grounds to believe that he knowingly, voluntarily, and significantly contributed to the PPS’s abuses.”The CID had found that during his initial application for refugee status, he had "attempted to portray himself as a low-level mail carrier with minimal involvement in policing activities," noting "that this account was inconsistent with written statements" in his service records with the PPS.Due to this, Malhi was found to be inadmissible to Canada and was set to be deported in 2024..Malhi appealed this decision to the Federal Court for a review and stated that he "...was not involved in any crimes against humanity, nor did he endorse or contribute to them," but did admit that he "...was aware of the crimes against humanity and the use of torture by the PPS but did not leave the force because he had to earn a living to support his family."Despite this, Justice Meaghan M. Conroy has said that the CID's reasons for Mali's deportation "do not demonstrate that the heterogeneous nature of the PPS was factored into the CID’s analysis," and that "according to the objective evidence filed by the minister, constable (the rank held by Malhi for most of his tenure) is the lowest rank in the PPS. This omission is a serious error.”Conroy concluded that the CID's decision "... lacks the hallmarks of reasonableness — justification, transparency and intelligibility—and is therefore set aside."Conroy granted Malhi's request for a review and that his case will be sent "back for redetermination by a different decision-maker.”
