{"id":217441,"date":"2025-10-16T14:09:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T14:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/217441\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T14:09:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T14:09:08","slug":"canadian-refugee-applicant-held-by-ice-says-he-crossed-border-by-accident-now-canada-wont-take-him-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/217441\/","title":{"rendered":"Canadian refugee applicant held by ICE says he crossed border by accident \u2013 now Canada won\u2019t take him back"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Mahin Shahriar entered the U.S. on May 12 after what he believes was a human trafficking attempt.Family of Mahin Shahriar\/Supplied via THE CANADIAN PRESS<\/p>\n

A Canadian refugee applicant from Bangladesh who is being held in a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Buffalo says he crossed the border into the U.S. by mistake \u2013 and now Canada won\u2019t take him back.<\/p>\n

Mahin Shahriar told The Canadian Press he entered the U.S. on May 12 after what he believes was a human trafficking attempt.<\/p>\n

Shahriar said he was struggling with depression and \u201ca friend\u201d offered him a place to stay for a few days near Montreal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to spend some time out of my home, and he said he had a place I could stay,\u201d Shahriar said in a phone interview from ICE custody.<\/p>\n

Shahriar said the address he was given led to a rural road that turned out to be close to the Canada-U.S. border.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was instructed by my friend who was on a call. So he was guiding me for everything, like he was looking on a GPS and he just instructed me on where to go,\u201d Shahriar said in the phone interview.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen I found myself in the U.S. It was not my intention.\u201d<\/p>\n

Number of asylum seekers turned back by Canada grows despite U.S. deportation threat<\/a><\/p>\n

Shahriar said that once he realized he was in the United States, he approached some border patrol officers to explain his situation. Shahriar said he thought they would help him return to Canada, but he was taken into custody instead.<\/p>\n

An Aug. 1 e-mail sent by ICE to Shahriar\u2019s lawyer, Washim Ahmed, says the U.S. will not compel Canadian authorities to accept Shahriar.<\/p>\n

Both Shahriar and Ahmed said ICE has recognized Shahriar could face harm if he is deported to Bangladesh, but that could still happen. <\/p>\n

Ahmed told The Canadian Press that Shahriar is at risk of detention and torture if he is returned to Bangladesh. He faces obstruction of justice charges for helping his mother and younger sister flee the country.<\/p>\n

Shahriar said that after his parents\u2019 marriage broke down, he, his mother and sister fled to Canada.<\/p>\n

Ahmed said Shahriar is not being deported to Bangladesh at this point because ICE does not have his travel document and noted Shahriar\u2019s desire to re-enter Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201c[ICE] said they tried to send me back to Canada, but Canada denied my entry. After that they didn\u2019t tell me anything,\u201d Shahriar said.<\/p>\n

The U.S. is no longer a safe harbour for domestic violence refugees, but crossing into Canada is often impossible<\/a><\/p>\n

The Canada Border Services Agency does not comment on specific cases. In an e-mailed reply, a CBSA spokesperson said the agency does not intervene on behalf of foreign nationals subject to immigration enforcement in another country.<\/p>\n

The spokesperson said that under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, anyone trying to enter Canada must appear at a CBSA examination centre and entry is judged on a case-by-case basis.<\/p>\n

Ahmed said ICE won\u2019t bring Shahriar to a CBSA examination centre without prior approval from the CBSA.<\/p>\n

Ahmed said he is working to schedule an urgent Federal Court hearing to press the CBSA to accept Shahriar\u2019s transfer to Canada on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cRegardless of what status he may have had prior to leaving Canada, he was a resident of Canada,\u201d Ahmed said. \u201cHe was the resident of Canada and he had his first blood family member in Canada, his sister and his mother. Both of them are maintaining valid legal status.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ahmed said that under the Safe Third Country Agreement, the CBSA should accept Shahriar from the U.S. The agreement states that a refugee can\u2019t make an asylum claim in Canada or the U.S. if they arrived in the other country first.<\/p>\n

Asylum claims from U.S. citizens have jumped since Trump took office, figures show<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSo [the Safe Third Country Agreement] requires that if somebody\u2019s detained either in the U.S. or in Canada within 14 days of their entry, then the country shall return the person to the country that they came from, which is Canada,\u201d Ahmed said.<\/p>\n

Shahriar signed U.S. immigration documents on Sept. 24 saying he is not seeking protection in the U.S. due to his family being approved for asylum in Canada and his own pending asylum application.<\/p>\n

Shahriar, who has been in Canada since 2019, said he drove an Uber to support his mother and younger sister. His mother is a refugee and his sister is attending school full-time.<\/p>\n

Ahmed said the stress of the situation is having a detrimental effect on Shahriar\u2019s family.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis mother already has been hospitalized a few times because of depression and the mental health toll,\u201d Ahmed said.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Shahriar\u2019s sister] is trying extremely hard to work and she was telling me that she may have to stop studying because she can\u2019t afford tuition and fees and support the family while working and studying.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Shahriar\u2019s mother is a recognized refugee, Shahriar\u2019s initial refugee application was not accepted.<\/p>\n

Ahmed said Shahriar\u2019s initial application wound up being part of an immigration scam run by a fraudulent immigration consultant, according to his lawyer. The rejection led to the mental health challenges that contributed to him ending up in ICE custody. <\/p>\n

Ahmed filed a pre-removal risk assessment for Shahriar earlier this year to try to keep him in Canada.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Mahin Shahriar entered the U.S. on May 12 after what he believes was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217442,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,1008,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-217441","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-pleasemod","11":"tag-top-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topnews","14":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}