The guiding principles on internal displacement as international minimum standard and protection tool

Refugee Survey Quarterly

Volumn 24, Issue 3, 2005, Pages 27-36

  Kälin, Walter ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF BERN   (Switzerland)

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REFUGEE;

EID: 27144475315     PISSN: 10204067     EISSN: 1471695X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/rsq/hdi050     Document Type: Article

References (30)

1. A/59/205, 21 March 2005, para. 210.
2. Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, Addendum to the Report of the Representative of the Secretary-General, Mr. Francis M. Deng, submitted pursuant to Commission resolution 1997/39, 11 February 1998, UN Doc E/CN.4/1998/53/Add.2.
3. At the time of this writing it was not know whether the General Assembly would adopt this text.
4. E/CN.4/2005/L.60, 14 April 2005, para. 7.
5. See Roberta Cohen, "The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement: An Innovation in International Standard Setting", Global Governance 10 (2004), 459-480, at 469-70
6. Commission on Human Rights Resolution 1996/52 (UN Doc E/CN.4/RES/1996/ 52, 19 April 1996) called "upon the Representative of the Secretary-General to continue, on the basis of his compilation and analysis of legal norms, to develop an appropriate framework in this regard for the protection of internally displaced persons".
7. Report of the Representative of the Secretary-General, Mr. Francis M. Deng, submitted pursuant to Commission resolution 1997/39, Addendum, Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, E/CN.4/1998/53/Add.2 11 February 1998, Introductory note to the Guiding Principles, paras. 9 and 10.
8. Compilation and Analysis of Legal Norms, Report of the Representative of the Secretary-General on Internally Displaced Persons, UN Doc. E/CN.4/ 1996/52/Add. 2 (1995) and Part II, Legal Aspects Relating to Protection Against Arbitrary Displacement, UN Doc. E/CN4/1998/53/Add.1 (1998).
9. For the drafting history of the Guiding Principles see, e.g., Cohen, op.cit., at 460-465.
10. See Walter Kälin, Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, Annotations, Washington D.C. 2000, highlighting in detail the legal basis for each of the Principles.
11. See article 12(1) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, articles 49 and 147 Geneva Convention IV, Articles 51(7), 78(1) and 85(4) of Protocol I, Articles 4(3)(e) and 17 of Protocol II.
12. Article 16 of the ILO Convention No. 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries.
13. See Article 3 of the 1984 Convention against Torture and the case law regarding Article 7 of the 1966 Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Article 3 of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights.
14. Jean-Marie Henckaerts/Louise Doswald-Beck, Customary International Humanitarian Law, Volume I: Rules, ICRC/Cambridge University Press 2005.
15. Id., at 457. On "ethnic cleansing" see 461-2.
16. Other rules relevant for the protection of property of IDPs are Rule 50 (prohibition "of destruction and seizure of property of an adversary [...], unless required by imperative military necessity"), Rule 52 (prohibition of pillage) and Rule 103 (prohibition of collective punishment).
17. See the references above in the introduction to this article.
18. Protect or Neglect: Toward a More Effective United Nations Approach to the Protection of Internally Displaced Persons, An Evaluation by Simon Bagshaw and Diane Paul, Brookings-SAIS Project on Internal Displacement and the Inter-Agency Internal Displacement Division of OCHA, November 2004, at 3. The study is available online at www.brookings.edu/fp/ projects/idp/protection_survey.htm.
19. Id., at 4.
20. According to the Guiding Principles internally displaced persons 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".
21. Implementing the Collaborative Response to Situations of Internal Displacement, Guidance for UN Humanitarian and/or Resident Coordinators and Country Teams, Inter-Agency Standing Committee, December 2005, at 41.
22. Report of the Representative of the Secretary-General on the human rights of internally displaced persons, Walter Kälin, submitted pursuant to Commission on Human Rights resolution 2004/55, E/CN4/2005/ 84, 31 December 2004, para. 43. For the categorization of these obligations under international human rights law see Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 31 [80], Nature of the General Legal Obligation Imposed on States Parties to the Covenant, CCPR/21/Rev.1/ Add.13, paras. 6, 7,15.
23. Implementing the Collaborative Response, op.cit, at 44.
24. This category is addressed by Principles 6 (2)(a), 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15(a) und (d), 28(1), etc.
25. See mainly Principles 7(2) 18 and 19.
26. E.g. Principles 14, 15b und (d), 16, 17, 20, 22(a), (c), (d) und (e).
27. E.g. Principles 21, 22(b), 23, 29.
28. For the reasons why the former Representative refrained from proposing elaboration of a convention on the human rights of IDPs, see Walter Kälin, "How hard is soft law? The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and the Need for a Normative Framework", in: Recent Commentaries about the Nature and Application of the Guiding Principles in Internal Displacement, The Brookings-CUNY Project on Internal Displacement, April 2002, at 4-7.
29. "In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All", A/59/205, 21 March 2005, para. 210.
30. African Union, Executive Council, Fifth Ordinary Session 25 June - 3 July 2004, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Decision 127 (V) on the Situation of Refugees, Returnees and Internally Displaced Persons, reproduced in Doc. EX.CL/Dec. 93 - 164 (V).