“Witness to My Own Exile”

Ana Cisneros
2004

This paper demonstrates how the 1984 Canadian immigration system failed to

protect me and violated my rights as a Convention refugee by forcing me to marry

“within ninety days of arrival” to Toronto as a condition for protection. After my mother

was disappeared in El Salvador in September 1982, I claimed refuge in Canada. Writing

this paper is not only an attempt to make sense of my exile and pain as a war survivor,

but also to show that heterosexist and discriminatory public policies in the Canadian law

dramatically shape the lives of refugee and immigrant women. By reinforcing the cycles

of impunity in Canada and abroad, the system fails to restore dignity to refugee

communities.

I was seventeen when my mother was taken away by death squads in El Salvador.

According to witnesses, it was around 5:45 p.m. when five heavily armed men

intercepted her while she was walking towards the bus stop in the company of her co-

workers at the end of her shift at the Psychiatric Hospital. They got her into a white car

and she lost consciousness due to the beatings to her head, face, chest and back. I

managed to survive for two years between 1982 and 1984, despite the fact that her

disappearance left me alone, without a support system to face the horrors of the war in El

Salvador. Being a teenager in such difficult times was challenging for me. I remember

that before the war I was a happy teenager and a good student. I had a boyfriend who

later left for Mexico (escaping the national army’s forced conscription) and who made it
to Canada as a Convention refugee in 1983. I also had family members who had

immigrated to Canada in the mid 1970s.

I left El Salvador for Mexico City in February 1984, where I joined my sister in a

shelter for Salvadoran refugees. As soon I arrived, I went to the Canadian Embassy and

reported to the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) office so I

could get moral, legal and financial support. At the Embassy, I disclosed that I was

looking for asylum and provided testimony regarding my mother’s disappearance and the

consequences I faced because of my ongoing search for her whereabouts. My sister, her

family and I found that our lives were threatened because of our efforts to find my

mother. We were singled out by our communities, by the military and by other

authorities. I provided as much information as I could regarding my fear of facing the

same fate as my mother.

Nine months after my arrival in Mexico, I received the landing paper, which

stated that I “must marry fiancée, within 90 days of landing and show proof of

compliance to Immigration within 90 days”. In box 15, the landing paper shows the full

name of my boyfriend as a person willing to assist. In addition, box 16 does not indicate

my intended occupation even though in my interview I told the Immigration official that I

was a student and a cosmetologist. Box 19 shows that my case was classified as a

Convention Refugee “CR”. Box 20 shows that my case was processed under a Special

Refugee Program. The 1978 Immigration regulations establish that “an individual may

sponsor the application for landing of a person whom she or he intends to marry upon

arrival in Canada”, therefore the couple must marry within 90 days of landing. Failure to

do so would imply removal from Canada to the person entering the country1.
1
Wydrzynski, page 106.
 I was in such desperate need of refuge that I did not realize what such a

requirement meant, nor did I realize that forcing me to marry within 90 days was

discriminatory. Despite the Refugee Convention’s stipulation that the state recognize

fear of persecution in assessing the risk for a refugee, I was not accorded that right. The

fact that I was being targeted and ostracized by my immediate community in El Salvador,

and was therefore destined to live in fear and at risk if sent back to El Salvador was not

acknowledged. Even though I provided substantial evidence for assessment, I still faced

barriers to protection. My rights to life, liberty, livelihood, security, integrity, dignity, and

autonomy2 were jeopardized by the immigration system when my right to refuge3 was not

even assessed, and my status was made conditional upon an imposed marriage.

The Refugee Convention provides a framework of action in order to assist refugees

seeking protection. A refugee is “any person who, owing to well-founded fear of being

persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social

group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or,

owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country of his

nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the

protection of that country… is unwilling to return to it4.” The definition compels the

signatory states to provide not only protection, but also calls on them to “restore dignity”

to refugees and to ensure their exercise of fundamental rights and freedoms.

2
Goodwin-Gill, page 8; Greatbatch, page 524.
3
Goodwin-Gill explains in page 15 that the “principle of refuge” seeks to provide a multifaceted dimension
the need of those requiring protection. It does not include “the shipwrecked, the victim of natural disaster,
the conscientious objector or the deserter”.
4
Immigration Act. 1976-77, c. 2, s.1; also, General Assembly resolution 428 (V) of December 14th, 1950.
 In addition, states are asked to link persecution and human rights abuses in

political and armed conflict situations, so immigration decisions are sustained on

international human rights instruments5. Despite the fact that Canada had signed and

ratified the Convention Against all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)

in 1980, in 1984 the Canadian immigration system did not acknowledge the different

experiences that men and women refugees face when fleeing a war.

In my case, Immigration Canada imposed a discriminatory re-settlement

requirement that assigned me a domestic and dependent role. The Canadian state was

unwilling to protect me directly or to recognize me as a person with my own needs. My

need for protection was not assessed according to international law. The marriage

requirement violated article 16(b) of the CEDAW that recognizes a woman’s right to

freely choose whom and when to marry.

Through research on my own immigration process, I have identified that there is a

persistent trend in the way protection is provided to refugee women. Most of the

protection problems for women are related not only to the breakdown of family units and

women’s domestic role during the conflict, but also to the imposition of androcentric

values by the receiving state. For instance, during 1983 and 1985, 8 153 women, who

were Convention refugees or designated class refugees, were accepted either as

Convention refugees because they were heads of family or because they qualified as

dependants6. Women who had families (husband or children) were more likely to

5
Guidelines on Civil War Situations, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Convenant on
Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and the
1949 Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (as well as Protocol
II to this Convention), Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women and
the Convention on the Political Rights of Women.
6
Refugee Perspectives, 1986-87, Refugee Affairs Division, June 1986. P. 11
receive protection. This means that more than half of the women entering Canada

between 1981 and 1986 were in the family class, even though the Convention requires

states to look at each refugee case individually, without making assumptions or trying to

fit profiles into social norms. It’s my contention that even though the 1976 Immigration

Act recognizes the principle of universality, sex was used as a criterion for the admission

of refugees. Therefore women were admitted in greater numbers under the family class or

as accompanying dependants of principal applicants than as single claimants.

Not surprisingly, the immigration official chose to assign my boyfriend (listed as

my “fiancé”) as my next of kin in the application form, above my other relatives who

were also living in Toronto. This denied me the choice of immigrating to Canada in the

refugee class, which back in 1984 was an adaptation of the definition of “Convention

Refugee”. Under the refugee class, anybody could have sponsored me without forcing

me to marry “within 90 days of landing”. Because I was never counselled, I was not

aware that sections 6(1) of the Immigration regulations allowed for a process to vary the

conditions, when they could not be met7. It has been established that 8 many of the

problems faced by refugee women stem from the way their status is defined through

family relationships, dependency relationships incorporated into entry requirements, and

sponsorships. This affects women’s access to social programs. I feel that landing in

Canada and receiving permanent residence status did not end my vulnerability nor my

need for protection. Instead I was subjected to gender discrimination. The Canadian state

failed to provide me with an adequate and durable solution.

7
Galloway, 1997.
8
The non-governmental organizations working group on refugee women organized the International
Consultation on Refugee Women, Geneva, November 15-19, 1988. The consultation provided a forum to
search for answers/ measures/ guidelines in order to address female-specific problems.
 I identify several contradictions in the way my refugee case was handled. The

primary contradiction is that despite being recognized as a Convention Refugee, I was

forced to marry. Due to a 1978 Immigration regulation, I was facing the threat of being

sent back to El Salvador if I did not marry or decided to challenge the requirement. It is

clear to me that returning to El Salvador was not an option at the time.9 Today I

discover that a refugee may not be removed from Canada unless it is on the grounds of

criminal or subversive activities10. Even then, the removal requires the consent of the

Immigration Minister.

Once the Canadian government had recognized my traumatic situation, it was

obligated 11 by international law to provide me with all forms of protection, independently

of my age, gender, race, status or support network in Canada. Since being a Convention

refugee is an interim status12 prior to obtaining the permanent residence, there was no

need to attack my dignity and autonomy by mandating marriage. I was going to become a

permanent resident anyway. I feel as if I passed from the patriarchal custody of the

United Nations and the Canadian state to the patriarchal protection of my boyfriend. How

many times must a young woman be “rescued” in order to receive rightful protection as a

refugee?

Moreover, the patriarchal expectations and requirements forced upon me by the

immigration process did not restore my dignity13. The fact that the Canadian government

9
The Immigration Regulation, 1978 established that a durable solution in respect that there is no possibility
within a reasonable time for voluntary repatriation or an offer to re-settlement.
10
Wydrzinski, page 79
11
Wyndrzinski, page 17. Canada is obliged to protect refugees, as it is signatory State of the Convention
relating to the status of refugees.
12
Wyndrzinski, page 78. Convention refugees and immigrants share a state of “interim status” at some
point in their immigration process and prior to become permanent residents.
13
Greatbach 518. “Women’s experiences of persecution do not fit frameworks applied to processing of
refugee cases, because the male paradigm guides the process”.
silenced my traumatic experience affected my capacity to heal from the disappearance of

my mother. Furthermore, my healing process was affected by the regulation of my

sexuality14 through an immigration requirement that restricted my personal autonomy. I

doubt that a young refugee teenager can heal when her history of war and trauma is

ignored - when she is forced to meet an immigration requirement based on abuse of

power, which is how I choose to name the way the Canadian state handled my case.

In conclusion, big questions remain: If there was more than one person willing to

sponsor me, why did the Immigration official choose my boyfriend to be the sponsor?

When using two different types of regulations for the same immigration case (for

example, using the refugee class and family class at the same time), why not recognize

alternative support systems for refugee women that extend beyond the nuclear family?

I demand at least an apology. An apology can be empowering 15. The recognition

of wrongdoing by the Canadian state for imposing a discriminatory requirement would

mean embracing me as an equal in a society that discriminated against me in the worst

moments of my life. Receiving Canadian citizenship does not erase from my history the

pain of silencing my trauma. I believe I have a responsibility to unveil such

discriminatory practices against refugee women, which are embedded in the Canadian

immigration system even today. I hope this insight into my own immigration case

exposes the contradictions of the immigration process, providing evidence to policy

makers, and to society as a whole of the dynamics and impact of sexism in the day to day

lives of refugee women. I offer this statement on behalf of those refugee women who

14
Greatbatch 519, 520. Quoting Meijer, M. “Oppression of Women and Refugee Status” 1985.
15
Charlie Roach, Racism and National Consciousness Conference, University of Toronto, October 26, 2002.
Roach elaborated on the responsibilities of those excluding others and the political dimension when the
traumatized confronts the nation. He also addressed the ethics of being of survivor.
have no capacity to go public at this point, because they may have been forced to remain

in Canada without status or forced to leave the country just in the name of “justice”.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Boyd, Monica. “Immigrant Women in Canada: Profiles and Policies” (1987).
Employment and Immigration Canada. Pp. 16 - 20

Crawford, J. and Hyndman P. “Three Heresies in the Application of the Refugee

Convention”. (1989) International Journal of Refugee Law Vol. 1 No. 2, Oxford
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Employment and Immigration Canada. “Refugee Perspectives 1986 - 1987” (1986),

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Supply and Services Canada.
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Galloway, Donald, ”Essentials on Canadian Law: Immigration Law”, (1997) Faculty of

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Goodwin-Gill, Guy S. “The Language of Protection” (1989), International Journal of

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Immigration Act. 1976 –77, c. 2, s1.

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OTHER SOURCES OF INFORMATION

Roach, Charlie. Racism and National Consciousness Conference, New College,
University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario. October 26, 2002.