Absolutely. Let us suppose that the woman was abused by a figure of authority and she now finds herself in front of an official. She will systematically project onto the person. All of a sudden, the official brings her back to the situation that she fled because, in the circumstances at hand, she will not necessarily make the link between the past and the fact that this could be a friendly figure of authority. She therefore is intimidated from the very moment she finds herself face to face with an official. Even if one has not been a victim of violence, one is intimidated when faced with a person representing authority, especially if it is a representative of Immigration Canada from whom one is hoping to obtain permission to stay in Canada.
I therefore say that when a woman has been the victim of violence, or the victim of prejudice because her sexual orientation is different from the so-called “norm“, it is difficult for her to confide in me, and even more so to confide in an official. I am very doubtful that after eight days a woman would be ready to confide in an official. The intimidation factor is clearly there. She is in a terrible psychological state, as I mentioned earlier. It would be unrealistic to think that such a woman would open up like a flower and start telling us anything about herself.