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Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Canadian-Egyptians flying back to Canada after their vacation on Egyptian passports !


Simple logic is not everybody's forte.  If you have become a Canadian citizen, you are supposed to travel on a Canadian passport .... at least that's what I thought everybody would know.  I don't know how it works for dual citizenship holders who have their feet wobbling in two boats. 

Nicholas Keung writing at TorontoStar:
Warning to dual citizens: Travelling with a foreign passport may make it tough to come home to Canada.

What happened to a Milton family returning from a summer holiday in Florida on Air Canada offers a cautionary tale for Canadians who use a foreign passport when travelling outside the country.
Canadian citizens Wael Ghali, his wife, Mira Wassef, and their teenage boys, Michael and Youssef, were stuck in the Tampa airport after an Air Canada agent refused to let them board their flight because she didn’t accept their Egyptian passports and photo citizenship certificates as valid documents to re-enter Canada.

“We’d called the Canada Border Services Agency before we left for Florida and we were told it’d be totally fine,” said Ghali, an English teacher from Egypt, who moved here in 2008 and took the oath with his family at a citizenship ceremony days before leaving for the 10-day trip on July 1. “We did our diligence.”
In normal circumstances, permanent residents who have yet to become Canadian citizens must travel with passports from their country of origin, plus what’s called a PR (permanent resident) card issued by Ottawa, as proof that they can legally stay in Canada and do not need a visa.

However, when someone becomes a Canadian citizen, the PR card is taken away — as was the case for the Ghali family — and coming home to Canada may become a problem with a foreign passport unaccompanied by a visitor’s visa.

Ghali, 45, said the family had booked their vacation in March and were notified about their citizenship test later. They were scheduled for their citizenship ceremony on June 24, leaving them less than five business days to apply for a Canadian passport.
To avoid incurring additional costs — $857 — for an urgent pickup of four Canadian passports, Ghali contacted border officials for ...........

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