Koulian

MEMORANDUM *

Nadezhda Koulian and her daughter Roza, citizens of Russia, petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ dismissal of their appeal from an Immigration Judge’s denial of their application for asylum. The BIA found that Koulian did not establish past persecution or a well-founded fear of future persecution on account of either her Jehovah’s Witness religion or Armenian ethnicity. We deny the petition.

Findings of the BIA are reviewed for substantial evidence, a deferential standard under which they must be upheld unless the evidence compels a contrary result. See Ghaly v. INS, 58 F.3d 1425, 1429 (9th Cir.1995). Persecution is “an extreme concept that does not include every sort of treatment our society regards as offensive.” Id. at 1431 . Whether treatment rises to the level of persecution is a heavily fact-dependent question, which comparison to similar cases helps to answer. See Krotova v. Gonzales, 416 F.3d 1080, 1084 (9th Cir.2005).

In combination, the incidents cited by petitioners pale in comparison to those in cases where asylum applications have been *643 granted, and are factually similar to those in cases where asylum has been denied. Compare…

I believe that the evidence in the record compels the conclusion that Koulian has established a well-founded fear of persecution on account of her Jehovah’s Witness religion and her Armenian ethnicity. See Al-Harbi v. INS, 242 F.3d 882, 888 (9th Cir.2001) (noting that, to demonstrate eligibility for asylum, “even a ten percent chance of persecution may establish a well-founded fear”). The Russian government persecuted Koulian on numerous occasions. Once, armed militia men and a lash-bearing Cossack 1 broke up a religious meeting she was conducting at her house. These men threatened that if Koulian continued to hold religious meetings in her house, she would be imprisoned. In addition, Koulian was fired from her job as a public school teacher for engaging in religious practices. Koulian credibly testified that she and her daughter were discriminated against by public school officials as Jehovah’s Witnesses and as Armenians.

The Country Report Koulian submitted indicates that Armenians are singled out for “arbitrary searches and detention on the pretext of fighting crime and enforcing residential registration requirements.” It goes on to state that Russian governmental authorities…