Mapalad

MEMORANDUM **

Romeo Duyan Mapalad, a native and citizen of the Philippines, petitions for review of the decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) affirming an Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) denial of his requests for asylum and withholding of deportation. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1105a. 1 We grant the petition for review and remand to the BIA for further proceedings.

Mapalad arrived in the United States in 1991, and he filed an asylum application based on his fear of persecution on account of his activities as an informant against the New People’s Army (“NPA”), a communist guerilla organization in the Philippines, that lead to threats against his life. 2 The IJ denied Mapalad’s asylum application after concluding that Mapalad was not credible, and in the alternative, that the threats against him were not on account of a protected ground.

Where, as here, the BIA adopts and affirms the IJ’s decision without its own independent analysis, we review the IJ’s decision as the basis for the agency’s decision. Mar iscal-Sandoval v. Ashcroft, 370 F.3d 851, 854 (9th Cir.2004). We review an IJ’s findings, including adverse credibility determinations, under the…