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A United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
Submission to:
The Conservative Party Globalisation and Global Poverty Policy Group
March 2007
“At a time of rising intolerance, fuelled by security concerns and confusion in public opinion between migrants and refugees, we are bound first to preserve asylum and rebuild trust in asylum systems. I want to call on humanitarian and rights-minded politicians and concerned members of the civil society and media; we need to work together and UNHCR is willing to cooperate with all.”
Antonio Guterres, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
1. Executive Summary
1.1. UNHCR welcomes this opportunity to input into the future direction of the Conservative Party’s policies on globalisation and global poverty.
1.2. UNHCR recommends that the Conservative Party should pay special attention to the following areas in relation to refugees and asylum seekers:
1.2.1. Humanitarian Assistance – Development Aid Gap – UNHCR, as the international community’s sole refugee protection organisation, also provides humanitarian assistance in crisis situations. UNHCR recognises a clear distinction between emergency relief, and development aid, which aims to reduce poverty. In many situations there is a gap between humanitarian aid and development assistance which must be bridged if lasting solutions to forced displacement can be achieved.
1.2.2. The Asylum-Migration nexus - The issues of asylum and refugee protection have become inextricably linked with the question of international migration often referred to collectively as ‘mixed migration’. This has led to states strengthening measures to deter the arrival of irregular people making it increasingly difficult for people to ‘seek and enjoy asylum in another state’, a right guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
1.2.3. Internally Displaced People (IDPs) – In recent years the international community has begun to debate major IDP issues more vigorously. In 2005 a more coordinated approach was agreed to tackle the problem of IDPs which gave UNHCR the lead role in overseeing the protection and shelter needs of IDPs and to coordinate and manage any camps which are established in areas where UNHCR has pre-existing operations or expertise. Given the increase in the number of people for whom the agency provides support, UNHCR remains concerned about ensuring reliable funding for both IDPs and refugees.
1.2.4. Trafficking in Persons - States have a responsibility to combat trafficking and to protect and assist victims of trafficking. UNHCR has a responsibility to ensure that refugees, asylum-seekers, internally displaced persons (IDPs), stateless persons and other persons of concern do not fall victim to trafficking. The Office also has a responsibility to ensure that individuals who have been trafficked and who fear being subjected to persecution upon a return to their country of origin, or individuals whose claim to international protection falls within the refugee definition are recognized as refugees and afforded international protection.
1.2.5. Gender – Refugee women share the protection problems experienced by all refugees, however, they are especially vulnerable to sexual and physical abuse, exploitation, discrimination and harassment and thus require special protection. UNHCR believes that women and girls who experience gender related persecution should have their claims for refugee status considered under the 1951 Refugee Convention.
1.2.6. Refugee Children –Only a fraction of the world’s refugees seek asylum in the UK including a small number of separated children. In such instances unaccompanied children need special protection, care and access to services.
1.2.7. Resettlement- Resettlement, together with local integration and voluntary repatriation, is one of the three long-term, or durable solutions UNHCR works to achieve on behalf of refugees. When refugees are particularly vulnerable in the country in which they have found asylum, and they cannot return to their country of origin, UNHCR attempts to resettle them in a safe third country. The UK’s Gateway Protection programme, a project which sees UNHCR work in close partnership with the Home Office, aims to resettle 500 particularly vulnerable refugees a year. UNHCR believes civil society groups, particularly local Conservative Party Clubs, should actively promote this vital refugee protection scheme.
1. Introduction
1.1. UNHCR’s mandate is to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide.
1.2. Refugees are legally defined as people who are outside their countries of origin because of a well founded fear of persecution based on their race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group, and who cannot or do not want to return home.
1.3. The number of asylum seekers arriving in industrialised countries, such as the UK, has plummeted in recent years. However, this does not mean that refugee problems have decreased but that the majority of people flee to countries adjacent to their country of origin.
1.4. UNHCR cares for over 21 million people worldwide, these are mainly refugees but also other populations of concern such as asylum seekers, stateless people, internally displaced people and returnees.
1.5. UNHCR is almost entirely funded by voluntary contributions. In 2007, UNHCR is seeking £538 million of which almost one-third is spent via UNHCR’s implementing partners, such as Non-Governmental Organisations.
1.6. UNHCR strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to repatriate voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country.
1.7. This responsibility includes the function of supervising, in co-operation with States, the application of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (the Refugee Convention).
1.8. In the UK, asylum applications are the lowest they have been for 13 years. This is due to several factors, conflicts still rage in some parts of the world and people still flee persecution, however, tightened border controls and severe immigration restrictions have caused some persons of concern to not seek asylum in industrialised states.
1.9. People fleeing persecution and war, yet not crossing international borders (internally displaced persons), are increasingly at the forefront of the humanitarian agenda. UNHCR’s formal mandate is to protect those in need of international protection, but there are increasing calls for the Agency to assist in crises such as these as well as large scale natural disasters such as the immediate aftermath of the South East Asia tsunami in 2005 and the devastating earthquake in Pakistan later in the same year. UNHCR often provides such support in regions where it has staff already on the ground.
1.10. The immediate causes of refugee flows are readily identifiable: serious human rights violations, persecution, violent political, ethnic or religious conflict, or international armed conflict. However, these causes often overlap with, or may themselves be provoked or aggravated by, such factors as economic marginalization and poverty, massive unemployment, environmental degradation, population pressure and poor governance. Conflation of issues of voluntary economic migration with issues surrounding forced migration by the sections of the media and some political figures is irresponsible.
2. The Humanitarian Assistance – Development Aid Gap
2.1. Emergency humanitarian assistance is essential in crisis situations such as armed conflicts and areas devastated by natural disasters. There is a clear distinction between such emergency assistance and development aid which is typically aimed at projects designed to reduce poverty and improve education and health facilities over the long term.
2.2. In many situations there is a gap between emergency humanitarian assistance and development aid.
2.3. Some refugee situations become protracted and require developmental aid as opposed to humanitarian assistance to satisfactorily meet the needs of the displaced. UNHCR has initiated Development Assistance for Refugees (DAR) programmes in some protracted refugee situations in an attempt to bridge the gap between humanitarian assistance and development aid. DAR programmes “move beyond the vital, but static, relief phase of an operation and towards improving the quality of life in asylum, building productive capacities of refugees (and preparing them for durable solutions) and contributing to poverty eradication in refugee hosting areas”.
2.4. In addition many refugees and internally displaced people (those helped by emergency humanitarian assistance) returning home are not being reintegrated into development aid projects effectively, missing out on the opportunities provided by such programmes.
2.5. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, has called for an effective transition from emergency humanitarian assistance to development aid so that long lasting solutions for problems associated with forced displacement can be achieved. It is important to stress the significance of ensuring the effective reintegration of returning refugees and internally displaced persons.
2.6. With regard to returning refugees, a failure to link human needs with development represents a major challenge for the UNHCR. Most poverty reduction programmes do not include returning refugees. UNHCR is principally a protection and not a development agency, as such, UNHCR would like to see linkages where we can hand-over to development agencies much earlier than at present. UNHCR is in discussion with UNDP to improve coordination on addressing returnees' needs.
2.7. UNHCR recommends that the UK government recognise the gap between emergency humanitarian assistance and development aid and seeks to bridge this gap with development programmes that acknowledge the specific needs of returning refugees.
3. The Asylum-Migration Nexus
3.1. The asylum-migration nexus describes the phenomenon whereby refugees and other migrants move from the poorer and less stable parts of the world, usually by irregular or illegal means, so as to seek asylum and/or take up residence in more prosperous and secure regions.
3.2. Given the lack of legal entry possibilities, resulting from tighter migration and security-related controls, a growing feature amongst some migrants is to resort to people-smugglers.
3.3. Due to the very few restricted routes to the UK in which someone can legally seek asylum, many are forced to seek help from traffickers and smugglers. To ensure that refugees and asylum-seekers continue to enjoy the right to seek asylum set out in the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, and do not become entangled in the growing web of migratory controls and sanctions to thwart people smuggling, UNHCR has been obliged to focus sharper attention on the relationship between refugee protection, international migration and development.
3.4. States have responded with some alarm to the issue of mixed migration, pointing to the relatively low proportion of asylum seekers who qualify for refugee status, the expense of maintaining their asylum procedures and social welfare systems, the difficulty of deporting those asylum claimants whose applications are rejected, and the security risks associated with the growth of irregular migration and human smuggling.
3.5. The primary response to this situation has been to introduce a raft of measures intended to obstruct or deter the arrival of irregular migrants in general and asylum seekers in particular, amongst whom there may well be those who have a bona fide claim to refugee status. This has made it increasingly difficult for people to ‘seek and enjoy asylum in another state’, a right guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
3.6. The developing countries in which most of the world’s refugees reside are all confronted with serious economic, infrastructural and security problems, and frequently do not provide the conditions in which to provide a high standard of refugee protection. UNHCR considers that industrialized countries, like the UK, should maintain equitable and effective asylum systems, to admit a larger number of refugees by means of resettlement programmes, and to provide tangible support to the notions of burden and responsibility-sharing, as endorsed by UNHCR’s Agenda for Protection, a document which builds upon the 1951 convention ensuring flexibility in approaches to refugee problems.
3.7. It is essential to ensure that the principle of asylum is not undermined by the effort to stem irregular migration. To that end UNHCR makes the following recommendations:
3.7.1. States should establish entry management systems that are able to identify new arrivals with international protection needs and which provide appropriate and differentiated solutions for all the profiles of people involved in mixed movements.
3.7.2. As previously stated in paragraph 2.3, states have an obligation to respect Article 31 of the 1951 Refugee Convention, which states that refugees must not be penalized on account of their illegal entry or presence in a country, ‘provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.’
3.7.3. Police officers, border guards, immigration and asylum officials must be trained to uphold the principles of international refugee law.
3.7.4. States should establish fair, thorough and efficient refugee status determination procedures so that asylum seekers are quickly informed of the outcome of their case. In situations of mass influx, the provision of prima facie refugee status to new arrivals has proven to be a particularly valuable means of safeguarding asylum and refugee protection.
3.7.5. In order to preserve the integrity and credibility of asylum systems, UNHCR believe steps must be taken to ensure the departure of those asylum seekers whose applications for refugee status are rejected after a full and fair examination of their case and who do not require other forms of humanitarian protection.
3.7.6. Industrialized countries, many of which are confronted with the prospect of diminishing and ageing populations and whose economies increasingly rely on illegal and casual migrant labour, should establish regular migration programmes.
3.7.7. Unless they are able to access the labour markets of the North by legal means, migrants from the South will continue to submit invalid claims to refugee status, further undermining public confidence in the whole notion of asylum.
3.7.8. Refugee resettlement programmes, like the UK’s Gateway Protection Programme, should be expanded. Resettlement is one of the key strategic focuses of UNHCR and is one pillar of the Ten Point Plan. This would allow more people who are in need of international protection to move in an orderly manner to, and gain residence rights in, a country which offers them a more promising future.
3.8. As long as the levels of human security differ so greatly from one part of the world to another the onward movement of refugees and asylum seekers will continue to take place.
3.9. UNHCR urges governments to take measures to reduce the North-South economic division and to improve the quality of life of persons in the developed world.
4. Trafficking in Persons
4.1. Trafficking in persons, the primary objective of which is to gain profit through the exploitation of human beings, is prohibited by international law and criminalized in the national legislation of a growing number of States. Although the range of acts falling within the definition of trafficking varies among national jurisdictions, States have a responsibility to combat trafficking and to protect and assist victims of trafficking.
4.2. UNHCR’s involvement with the issue of trafficking is essentially twofold. Firstly, the Office has a responsibility to ensure that refugees, asylum-seekers, internally displaced persons (IDPs), stateless persons and other persons of concern do not fall victim to trafficking. Secondly, the Office has a responsibility to ensure that trafficked individuals who fear being subjected to persecution upon a return to their country of origin, or individuals who fear being trafficked and whose claim to international protection falls within the refugee definition, are recognized as refugees and afforded the corresponding international protection.
4.3. Not all victims or potential victims of trafficking fall within the scope of the refugee definition. To be recognized as a refugee, all elements of the refugee definition have to be satisfied.
5. Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs)
5.1. The internally displaced “are persons or groups of persons who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflict, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights or natural or human-made disasters, and who have not crossed an internationally recognized State border.”
5.2. Currently, there are an estimated 23.7 million IDPs in at least 50 countries living amidst war and persecution. They have little legal or physical protection and a very uncertain future.
5.3. IDPs remain under the ‘protection’ of often antagonistic governments or prey to rebel militias.
5.4. UNHCR’s mandate does not specifically cover IDPs. But internally displaced civilians are often caught up in the same conflicts and face the same problems as refugees. Because of the UN Refugee Agency’s expertise, it has for years helped many of these people in countries such as Sri Lanka, Iraq, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Colombia, Angola and Sudan. Currently an estimated 6.6 million IDPs fall under UNHCR’s mandate.
5.5. In recent years the international community began to debate major IDP issues more vigorously: the question of the sanctity of state sovereignty versus human rights, how better to help these vulnerable people and what organizations should fulfill what roles.
5.6. In 2005, a more coordinated and cohesive approach to tackle the problem was agreed: Under the general umbrella of the office of the UN emergency relief coordinator, the UN Refugee Agency has been given the ‘lead’ role in overseeing the protection and shelter needs of IDPs as well as the coordination and management of any camps which are established. Other UN agencies have adopted similar roles in the areas of water, nutrition, health, logistics and telecommunications.
5.7. By August 2006, this approach was being applied in DR Congo, Uganda, Liberia, Somalia, Lebanon, and Chad.
5.8. Given the likely increase in the number of people for whom the agency will be providing support, one of the remaining concerns for UNHCR is ensuring reliable funding for both IDPs and refugees,.
6. Gender
6.1. Women share the protection problems experienced by all refugees. Many need protection against forced return to their countries of origin; security against armed attacks and other forms of violence; protection from unjustified and unduly prolonged detention; a legal status that accords adequate social and economic rights; and access to such basic items as food, shelter, clothing and medical care.
6.2. In addition to basic needs shared by all refugees, UNHCR believes that refugee women and girls may have special protection needs that reflect their gender: they frequently need, for example, protection against sexual and physical abuse, exploitation, and sexual discrimination and harassment in the delivery of goods and services.
6.3. UNHCR has consistently expressed the view that women and girls who experience sexual violence or other gender related persecution should have their claims for refugee status considered under the 1951 Refugee Convention.
6.4. UNHCR welcomes the UK Law Lords recent endorsement in the case of K and Fornah of the UN Refugee Agency’s guidelines setting out the principles that should be applied in assessing asylum claims based on the fear of being subjected to female genital mutilation. UNHCR has consistently advocated that the refugee definition, if properly interpreted, can encompass women who have been persecuted for gender-related reasons.
7. Refugee Children
7.1. The sudden and violent onset of emergencies, the disruption of families and community structures as well as the acute shortage of resources with which most refugees are confronted, deeply affect the physical and psychological well being of refugee children.
7.2. Many young people claiming asylum in the UK are considered 'separated children' - children under 18 years of age who are separated from both parents or their previous caregiver. In some cases, children are totally alone while others may be accompanied by extended members of families. In 2001, almost five percent of asylum applications were filed by 'separated children' in the UK.
7.3. These unaccompanied asylum-seekers are entitled to international protection under a broad range of universal and regional instruments. However, in the UK this protection and support is not always sufficiently integrated into national legislation and practice at the local level. As a result, young people may face a number of constraints, including: Inconsistency in support; difficulty accessing to mainstream education; or ineligibility for family tracing, contact and reunification.
7.4. In light of the challenges facing young refugee and asylum seekers in the UK, UNHCR recommends that as soon as a separated child is identified, a guardian or adviser should be appointed.
7.5. UNHCR welcomes such development in legislation and encourages EU member states to take the steps needed to apply locally such provisions.
7.6. Many children arrive in the UK with no documentation detailing their age and date of birth. This means that social services have problems determining the level of support a young person should receive. If a person's age is disputed, they face serious problems accessing appropriate services. If they are deemed to be over 18 they receive asylum support provisions instead and are treated as adults.
7.7. In the UK in certain circumstances asylum seeking children, some of which are unaccompanied, are detained. In the first nine months of 2006, 85 children had been held in detention solely under Immigration Act powers.
7.8. There is international consensus that children should not be detained. The UNHCR Guidelines on Refugee Children states in its preamble (page 37):
“Refugee children are children first and foremost, and as children, they need special attention…It is UNHCR's policy that refugee children should not be detained.”
7.9. Furthermore, the detention of children is incompatible with key articles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). Currently the UK government has a general reservation in relation to asylum seeking children on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
8. Resettlement
8.1. UNHCR recognises that refugees are not always able to return safely home or to remain in the country where they received asylum. There are situations in which resettlement to a third country, such as the United Kingdom, is the only safe and viable durable solution for refugees.
8.2. Thanks in large part to the generosity of resettlement countries and the tireless endeavour of local non-governmental organizations, resettlement from the initial host country to a third country of asylum has become a fundamental element of the system for the international protection of refugees.
8.3. Through resettlement, refugees and persons of concern gain legal protection, residency and often eventually citizenship from governments who agree to open up their communities to new members. The task of receiving and settling refugees requires that UNHCR works closely with central and local authorities, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and religious and social welfare groups.
8.4. In April 2003, the UK government created the Gateway Protection Programme (GPP) in close cooperation with UNHCR. The GPP aims to resettle up to 500 particularly vulnerable persons to the UK and will augment the existing Mandate and Ten or More resettlement schemes which have existed in the UK since the early 1970s.
8.5. The Gateway Protection Programme serves to strengthen the UK's commitment to refugee protection and international responsibility-sharing. The Programme is a vital channel for refugees to come to the United Kingdom.
8.6. UNHCR commends the steady progress of the Gateway Protection Programme and encourages the Government, with support from local authorities and civil society groups like Conservative Party Clubs, to pursue this as a key component of the United Kingdom’s responsibility-sharing of refugees globally.
UNHCR, London
March 2007
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