Limenew

MEMORANDUM ***

Mengensha Limenew (“Petitioner”) seeks review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA’s”) affirmance of the Immigration Judge’s (“U’s”) decision that Petitioner was not entitled to asylum. The final order of deportation was entered on June 25, 2001. The appeal to this court was filed on September 17, 2001. The transitional rules of the IIRIRA apply, mandating a 30-day time period for appeal. We dismiss the petition for review for want of jurisdiction.

(1) The time limit for filing a petition for review of a decision of the BIA is mandatory and jurisdictional. See, e.g., Lee v. INS, 685 F.2d 343 (9th Cir.1982). Mandatory and jurisdictional time limits are “not subject to the defenses of waiver, equitable tolling, or equitable estoppel, although there may still be exceptions based on unique circumstances.” Socop-Gonzalez v. INS, 272 F.3d 1176, 1187 (9th Cir.2001) (internal quotations omitted). The only circumstances deemed, thus far, to be “unique” are those in which there has been official misleading. As this court put it in Hernandez-Rivera v. INS, 630 F.2d 1352, 1355 (9th Cir.1980), “where there has been an official misleading [i.e., by a court or…