Sorry to see the difficulty of your circumstances. Hope you have a successful and speedy recovery.
Short answer regarding impact on
STATUS of travel to home country: once a refugee acquires Canadian citizenship they are no longer a protected person (acquiring Canadian citizenship results in the cessation of refugee status),
so travel to the home country has no effect on their status as a Canadian citizen.
Some clarifying observations: In contrast, traveling to home country while still a PR may constitute grounds for cessation of status, and if the RPD were to proceed with cessation, resulting in the cessation of protected person (refugee) status, that automatically terminates PR status.
That is: home country travel can result in losing refugee status and if this is while the individual is still a PR that also results in loss of PR status (with some exceptions). Not so for a Canadian citizen.
Short Answer Conclusion (for emphasis)
: Travel to the home country should have NO impact on your status as a Canadian citizen; so,
if it is safe to travel to the home country, it should be OK.
Longer Observations Regarding Question About Former Refugee Returning to Home Country:
Personal Risk Factor:
Obviously the most important consideration is the nature and extent of risk there is in returning to the home country. And obviously that depends on which country it is, the extent to which conditions in that country have changed since there was cause to flee and seek the protection of Canada, which includes the current conditions in that country, and of course the particular individual's circumstances, including circumstances incidental to the PR's return and stay, especially in regards to any particular dangers the PR might personally might encounter.
That's not about status as such. It is about personal safety. While being a Canadian citizen affords some protections provided by the Canadian government when traveling abroad, the nature and scope of this is far, far less than many realize . . . as a lot of people with Canadian citizenship living in Sudan very recently learned as internal instability and conflict there escalated. Especially when the individual is also a citizen of the country where they are located, the scope of what Canada can do to protect them is rather limited.
In any event, while the impact on an individual's status is hugely important, personal safety is the bigger, more important element.
Status as Canadian:
The difference between being a Canadian with citizenship status versus PR status is huge. As already noted, despite being a Canadian, travel to home country while still a PR can result in cessation of refugee status, and if that happens that automatically terminates PR status (with no right of appeal, barred from seeking Pre-removal Risk assessment, and barred for at least a year from making any H&C application for PR, making them inadmissible and subject to removal from Canada as soon as possible).
Further observations about this, for others (as a citizen you need not worry about this):
In particular, a Canadian with PR status obtained as a protected person, as a refugee, loses their status as a Canadian if their status as a refugee is terminated pursuant to cessation, subject to an exception for cases in which cessation, as determined by the RPD, is based on the reasons for needing protection ceasing to exist.
**
**Note: there is a difference between an adjudication determining a refugee's status has ceased because it is safe to return to the home country, which does not result in the termination of PR status, versus situations in which a refugee might travel to the home country because the reasons for needing protection no longer exist, which can trigger and constitute grounds for cessation based on reavailment or restablishment in home country. That is, even though refugee status could be ceased due to it being safe to return, that does NOT protect a PR-refugee from cessation based on other grounds, if there are other grounds. Travel to home country using home country passport creates a strong presumption of reavailment, and can (and quite often DOES) lead to cessation proceedings, with the result that PR status is lost -- and the fact that RPD could have based cessation on Section 108(1)(e) does NOT block the RPD from determining cessation based on reavailment.
An Unlikely to be Relevant Caveat (some just in case observations, and in part to explain why CBSA might have questions when returning to Canada)
:
A number of former refugees have reported elevated security related screening at the Port-of-Entry when they return to Canada. Well, reported this experience and complained about it.
For at least some of these cases, it appears the increased screening that is experienced was triggered by flags in their GCMS file relating to their previous status as a refugee.
This probably should not come as a surprise to any former refugees returning to Canada following travel to their home country.
What we do not know is whether or not, and if so to what extent, CBSA might be screening to identify possible misrepresentation cases. A former refugee's travel to the home country might, depending on a wide range of circumstances in the particular case, suggest the purported reasons for needing Canada's protection were not entirely accurate. While returning to the home country itself has no direct impact on a former refugee's Canadian citizenship, and is not in itself necessarily evidence of misrepresentations made in obtaining protected person status, obviously it can cause law enforcement (like CBSA) to have questions, such as to how is it safe now for this individual to travel to that country when at the time they applied for protection it was not. Misrepresentation at any stage of acquiring status in Canada is the one and only grounds for revoking a grant of naturalized citizenship. Former refugees who made no misrepresentations in applying for protection or PR have NOTHING to worry about.
