Iffat

dissenting.

I respectfully dissent. Though the BIA did not make an adverse credibility determination, there was substantial evidence in the record as a whole that supported its determination 1 that Iffat had not established a well-founded fear of persecution on account of her actual or imputed political opinion.

Her fear arose most in large part from her husband’s death. Though she thought he had been murdered for his politics, the evidence in the record does not establish that this was any more than speculation. There is no evidence that she or anyone in her family saw the body or established in any way that the police account, that he died of a heart attack, was false. The absence of threatening phone calls to her husband further weakened her inference that his death was a political assassination rather than a natural event. He died, she was suspicious of the police, and he had not had a heart attack before — this is not evidence that compels the conclusion that her husband was murdered for political reasons.

The shifting nature of her testimony was enough for the BIA to conclude that she had not established membership in the MÍQM, as opposed to having made a contribution to…

MEMORANDUM ***

Syeda Iffat, a native and citizen of Pakistan, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) dismissal of her appeal from an Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) denial of her application for asylum and withholding of deportation. We grant the petition for review and remand for further proceedings.

As the BIA noted, the IJ “failed to make a specific adverse credibility finding,” so Iffat’s testimony is accepted as true. See Mamouzian v. Ashcroft, 390 F.3d 1129, 1133 (9th Cir.2004). The BIA’s decision rested on a failure by Iffat to meet her “burden of proof of establishing past persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution.” We review this determination for substantial evidence. See Lata v. INS, 204 F.3d 1241, 1244-45 (9th Cir.2000).

Contrary to the BIA’s determination, the record compels the conclusion that If-fat did provide a “sufficiently descriptive” account of her activities with the Mohajir Quami Movement (“MQM”), a topic about which she was never asked to elaborate. See Akinmade v. INS, 196 F.3d 951, 957 (9th Cir.1999) (“The IJ’s concern for more specific information does not constitute a valid ground for denying Akinmade’s claim, especially…