events have shown having three elections just not create a democracy or eliminate human rights abuses elections are the product of democratic ideals they do not create democratic ideals this is extremely evident in this case where the democratically elected government of romania has consistently failed to uphold basic human rights for members of certain minority groups mr wagner is ethnically hungary in a group that has been persecuted and scorned and romania for years the record shows that he suffered persecution in numerous meeting on another occasion mr wagner was attacked while posting flyers for the hungarian you are political party in the two thousand election romanian used tore down as flyers and when mr wagner asked police for help they arrested him for littering they took him to the police station beat him severely and would not release them until he paid a large fine and see international and human rights watch and watch both report documents and document numerous instances of police beating people while in custody and forcing a families to pay large bribes for their release every specific incidents of persecution presented by mr wagner are supported by evidence in the country reports all of these experiences unfolded in a context of rising ethnic tensions based on  history of ethnic animus towards and variance in romania in addition senates takes declarations from family friends and his doctor showing that he suffered persecution and protected grounds i did not just speak the specific evidence or discredit it for problems of demeanor consistency or false instead i do use general country condition reports to dispute the petitioner specific evidence it's in a church legal principle that general country reports are not an adequate ground for was doing but if you read his his decision in detail you can see that he actually says and leader that he did not find any specific incidents of the exact same abuse happening to anyone else mentioned conditions in countries which the united states is seeking to have democratic relations with i'm sorry diplomatic relations with and i think that what we're trying to do here is look at the report as a whole and also sounds like you're doing two things one is romania and that they are members of the present ruling government they are but if you look at the reports as a whole they show that the success of that party was also by the success of nationalists you know phobic romanian party and both of those instances hungary and starting their political rights and seeing a phobic nationalism resulted in increased persecution of hungary and so after the two thousand election there were rallies supporting to expel hungary and from romania local officials denied certain laws regarding language rights religious rights and with returning with the returning churches all of these incidences paint a general picture of ethnic tensions in romania and i think that what the i j a did was pick out specific minor political political successes and use them to say that there are no more ethnic tensions and this is just false it's not reflected in the record and i think that you know this court has also filed the fact that elections are conducted and that certain extrapolate from the country condition reports you read them as a whole and the fact that you know just because something isn't mentioned in the report doesn't mean that it didn't happen and we've seen here all through the reports there are instances of police abus minorities are persecuted in romania that police officers persecute minorities and roumania and that they get away with it and this is basically everything's just totally parallels the evidence that mr wagner are presented and specific instances of persecution furthermore i day in an alternative finding based on crediting the petitioners testimony said that he could relocate within romania because his problems were purely local  i think that it's clear that when a petition our heads demonstrated has persecution that persecution there's a presumption that that persecution is countrywide and shifting of that burden back to the petitioner saying that he has to prove that his problems weren't properly local that shifts the burden away from its proper source where the government has to prove that the persecution wasn't countrywide furthermore j never never addressed the reasonableness of relocation or whether it be safe for the petitioner to do so i think both of these these holdings were in error they're not supported by substantial evidence in the record conditions not just the state department but amnesty international human rights watch etc did not contain similar store use but doesn't the applicant have to show only that something bad happened to them does it matter whether the same thing has happened to someone else or not well i think that in this case the i j a actually explicitly found that mr wagner testimony was quote highly implausible and right that the reason they didn't seem that other high during us were persecuted and therefore he didn't believe it which takes me back to my initial question does he have to show that to be credible that other people have suffered the same problem well i think that  a did conclude that mr wagner ours testimony suffered from a fatal inconsistency we tried on the one hand he alleged that he would be in reasonable fear of persecution on a country wide basis it should he return and that he was in reasonable fear of persecution on a countrywide basis that hunger eons were harassed and that the problems were pervasive throughout society this is mr von arse testimony on the other hand with respect to the specific incidents particularly the two thousand incident mr wagner testified to the contrary that the reason he was through and with exile by these two local police officers was because they were afraid of being a they were held accountable by their chain of command and that i fundamental inconsistency that the i g found with respect to specific incidents so you have a specific finding that mr wagner failed to provide credible testimony that he had either suffered persecution on account of either his hungary and ethnicity or on account of his political opinions and you have this fundamental inconsistency that he claims he was in reasonable fear of persecution but yet these two police officers judges the you link is that mr wagner testified in the specific incident that he was threatened with exile by these two police officers because they in turn were afraid of accountability in the system throughout th can't get a fair chance that they are harassed that there is no system in place and that is the fundamental inconsistency here thank you both testified that there is accountability and there is not accountability and then  immigration judge look to the country reports to look at the generalized statements so for example mr wagner claims that he was threatened with forced exile but if you look through the country reports because reports state on i think you would only reach that question if you if you did not have the predicate finding that the i j did which was that there was internal inconsistency and mr wagner story it's well that's true if you just disbelieve the person that things happened at all but looking at the broader question of whether whoever is the first one to be subjected to something has to lose because there isn't a previously published report of it but i think then you would be looking as to whether or not you fall into for instance a shaw situation or do you fall into a situation and i apologize for the pronunciation of that the it would only be if you have some sort of predicate finding that you then look to the country reports and i don't think you would get into a situation where the first to report would be in would be automatically barred or would face an adverse credibility finding it is the case saw in the circuit that if you have an adverse credibility finding certainly and that's what we have here then the absence of corroborative evidence the absence of other reports in the country reports can also be considered by the by the i determining whether the protection or has met his or her part of showing past persecution and a reasonable fear of future persecution but i would also like to turn in les you have other questions on that score to the fundamental question of past persecution and whether or not mr wagner met his burden of showing past persecution this court has been quite clear that you have to show a level of harm that the persecution must be on account of either a political opinion or ethnicity in this case and it has to be by the government or by forces that the government is unable or unwilling to control in this  are has in a somewhat shifting manner alleged that he was persecuted on account of his political opinions three that his membership in any party that is now part of the ruling coalition or in this claim that he was persecuted on account of his property is raising issues with police brutality but there is no evidence in this record that mr barnard was prosecuted on account of his having raised issues with police brutality in fact what you have is evidence that he went to police to complain about the romanian use and that's the one the few times that he did go to the  police he complained about specific incidents of conduct and when he went to the police for instance in two thousand those two police officers felt that they were accountable to the chain of command so if you look at situations like gr l or if you look at a situation like hassan you do not have criticism of a quote powerful political leader and you do not have a challenge to a policy or government official that is prevalent throughout the entire country there simply was no showing that the persecution was on account of a political opinion as that has been understood by this court as for the crash of whether or not the the  dar has shown that he was persecuted on account of his hungary and ethnicity the the record is not doesn't certainly does not compel the conclusion that was contrary to the i j a his credibility determination subject to prosecution on account of his hungary and ethnicity and finally moving to the question of relocation  come up under the under the convention against torture that would be part of the affirmative case so regardless of whether or not the immigration judge shifted the burden or not the the finding that  fact shift the burden to the government because if you look at the opinion when he refers to whether or not the clear probability has been shown he refers specifically to mr barnard burton event on the next page addresses the issue of relocation and does so by discussing the entire record he does this is classic language of burden shifting so he may not have used the exact words but he didn't fact shift the burden and he looked at factors like the societal conditions he looked at factors such as that the sister of the mother of still that there he has family there he has friends there and looked at the social tensions and determined that the social tensions with respect to hunger variance are primarily focused on issues like language and education as opposed to for instance the roma who are subject to beatings forced relocation that there are and so the i g did consider these types of factors that are appropriate and the mischaracterized the country reports and use that mischaracterization shouldn't i really feel the abuse that mr wagner suffered the way his difficulties unfolded beatings extortions police acting with impunity all of this is unassailable widespread and it's