Kheiro

*304 MEMORANDUM **

Najah Kheiro, a Chaldean Christian from Iraq, filed a petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) decision affirming without opinion the Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) decision denying asylum to Kheiro and his family. Where the BIA affirms the IJ’s reasoning, we review the IJ’s opinion rather than the BIA’s. See Arulampalam v. Ashcroft, 353 F.3d 679, 680 (9th Cir.2003). We grant the petition and remand for further proceedings.

The IJ concluded that Kheiro was ineligible for asylum based on an adverse credibility finding. We review an IJ’s adverse credibility findings under a “substantial evidence” standard, see Ding v. Ashcroft, 387 F.3d 1131, 1136 (9th Cir.2004), carefully reviewing the record to determine “whether the reasoning employed by the IJ is fatally flawed,” id. at 1137 (quoting Gui v. INS, 280 F.3d 1217, 1225 (9th Cir. 2002)). The IJ made three factual findings that led to his determination of “adverse credibility,” none of which is supported by substantial evidence.

The IJ found it “a significant fact” that Kheiro failed to mention in his asylum application an aborted attempt to leave Iraq in 1997, because assuming his travel was…