An introduction to Refugee Concept

1. REFUGEE CONCEPT
FRANK ASSEKO

2. Introduction:
Who is a refugee? (common attributes
Trace the origin of International refugee
protection in modern states?
Who is a refugee- law? (Geneva Convention)
Implication and Weaknesses of the Geneva
Convention?
Other response to refugee problem (OAU and
Cartagena Convention?

3. Common Definition (Attributes)
A person who has been obliged to abandon
his or her usual place of residence- Media
Journalist
Constitute people who have been forced
from their homes as a result of war, political
oppression
People displaced across borders- UNHCR

4. Common Definition (Attributes)
‘Boats people’- Canary Island
People who live in sprawling camps and are
dependent on international relief
organizations for their basic needs

5. Origin of Int’l Refugees Protection
Human history- displacement has existed
since the beginning of organized settlement
Ancient civilization
Human migration in Africa- led to permanent
settlement
Historians- refugee is a problem is a
modern concept- 21st
century

6. Cont’d
Refugeehood is associated to Westphalia
Treaty of 1648 & romantic nationalism in
Europe (Factors)
Recognition of sovereignty
State responsibility- individual protection &
territory
Country of nationality- people crossing
border required to show identification
When
Refugee is anyone fleeing a problem usually not of
their own making, heading towards another country
or a place within the country of their origin

7. 1680-religious problems- Huguenots
Law that outlawed Protestantism in France- US,
Switzerland, SA, Germany & Prussia
People fleeing Russian industrial revolution &
political revolution (1917) 1881-1920- Eastern
Europe
Emigration of Jews
1920- Unrestricted migration no need categorize
(protect)

8. Early Promise of Inte’l Refugee
Protection
End of WWI measures begun to be put in
place to regulate and resolve refugee
problems
Why?
– States allowed unrestricted migration- states did
not see each other as threats- Britain, Germany
competition for balance of power, industrial
revolution & transatlantic trade, colonialism
– magnitude of displaced people- 9.5 million
Define and give reasons for being a
refugee

9. Cont’d….
First World – 1914-1918:
Breakdown of Ottoman & Austro-Hungarian Empire
Russian revolution (1917) & creation of Soviet Union
Russia- fleeing civil conflict, persecution & totalitarian
regime & emerging ideology of Soviet U.
League of Nations- (Res. 26 Feb 1921)- HCR
( Nansen Fridtjof)- travel documents- Nansen
Passport- travel to safe places

10. Cont’d
Who were refugees?
Russian origin (territorial root) who did not enjoy or
no longer enjoys protection of national govt of USSR
& who has not acquire any other nationality
Armenian origin formerly subject of Ottoman empire
……….. Of Turkish Republic ………
1928- civil wars, & ethnic tensions
Turkish, Assyrian & Assyro-Chaldeans
Definition of refugee was territorially based
Characteristics of definition- ethnic not territory
No specific reason for fleeing

11. Cont’d……
1930:
Convention relating to Int’l status of Refugees- Oct,
1933
1938:
possessing or having possessed German nationality
& not possessing any other nationality who are
proved not to enjoy (in law or fact) protection of
German govt
Stateless persons not covered by previous
convention who have left Germany
Exempted people who left Germany for personal
convenience

12. Cont’d…..
End of WWII
UN-develop a definition & means of handling
refugee crises
IRO- displaced persons
person who has been deported from or has been
obliged to leave his country of nationality or a former
habitual residence as a result of Nazi or fascist regimes
of similar regimes which assisted them against the UN
eg people compelled to undertake forced labor or who
were deported for religious, racial or political reasons
victims of Falangist regimes- Spain
Unaccompanied children, war orphans outside
their country of orgin

14. Present Definition
1951 Geneva Convention
1967 Protocol
Universal Declaration on Human Rights-
1948
Humanitarian Law

15. 1951 Geneva Convention-
Definition
Refers to a person who
– as a result of events occurring before 1 Jan,
1951 and owing to well-founded fear of being
persecuted for reasons of race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social
group or political opinion, is outside the
country of his nationality or who not having a
nationality & being outside the country of his
habitual residence as a result of events
occurring in Europe and else where is unable
or owing to such fear is unwilling to avail
himself of the protection of that country’

16. 1967 Protocol- Definition
Refers to a person who
– ‘owing to well-founded fear of being
persecuted for reasons of race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social
group or political opinion, is outside the
country of his nationality and is unable or
owing to such fear is unwilling to avail himself
of the protection of that country’

17. Legal Definition
Well-founded- necessity
Asylum need no proof of prior persecutions for
refugee status (support claim)
Persecution- torture, illegal deprivation,
of freedom or extrajudicial execution
Canada- psychological trauma
(determination)- loss of children
Somalia (B. (P.V) (Re), C.R.D.D. No.12
(QL)- lost protection of her child & hence
will be further unable to protect her
daughter from being subjected to FGM

18. Legal Definition
Economic measures
Exclusion from labor market & possibility to
gain an income
Proof that subsistence or existenzminimum
is threatened
Yesidis in German not Syro-orthodox
Christians- gain Istanbul

19. Weaknesses of the Convention
Definition is ambiguous- interpretation and
application
Convention refugees
Embraces only person at risk of Eurocentric forms
of harm
Person is a refugee only if genuinely at risk of
persecution

20. Weaknesses:
Regarding- ground for protection
Tortured because you’re black person Vs.
discriminative punishment by a brutal
dictator =
Consequence the same- respect of basic
human rights
1991- English court of queen’s bench- refused to
grant protection Togo Muslim (Alassini) -argued if
he return to his country likely to be an object of
human sacrifice- common among other beliefs
systems who believe in human sacrifices

21. Weaknesses:
Fails to recognize the claims of persons
whose predicaments do not resemble those of
post-WWII
More attention to failed states
Fails to capture- more active forms of
persecution
Ignores the needs of involuntary migrants
who can’t link their fears to the five grounds
Criterion alienates- IDP’s ethical

22. Weaknesses of the
Convention
USA until 1980 considered refugees to be
people escaping communism
– Refugee who were a product of colonialism
not refugees
Convention indirectly targeted Soviet
Union and its communist allies
Vagueness of the reasons- 5

23. Weaknesses:
Persons displaced externally for reasons other
than individualized persecution- Armed conflict
Omission of people who have not crossed
International border

24. African states Response to 1951
Convention
African states became party to the
Convention though the Convention failed
to legally encompass refugees in Africa
– African states were not therefore not
under legal obligation to accord any
standards of treatment of refugees in
Africa

25. African states Response to 1951
Convention
– The Convention also did not reflect the
refugee situation in Africa
– There was thus a need to come up with a
legal instrument to reflect Africa reality

26. African Response to 1951
Convention
The of a Convention was also prompted
by increase in refugees resulting from
national liberation and decolonization
wars
– Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Sao Tome
and Principe, Equatorial Guinea, Cape Verde
and Guinea Bissau
– The flow of refugees to other countries
because a source of friction- Rwanda and
Burundi

27. Council of African Response to 1951
Convention Ministers recommended
African Refugee Convention- meeting in
Addis Ababa
– To avoid impairing UNHCR- the
temporariness of UN Convention was
removed
– Sep 1969 OAU Convention was adopted and
came into force 20th
June 1974- hence
World Refugee Day

28. OAU 1969 Refugee Convention-
Definition
States that Refugee:
– ‘Shall apply to every person who owing to
external aggression, occupation, foreign
domination or events seriously disturbing
public order in either part or whole of his
country of origin or nationality is
compelled to leave his place of habitual
residence in order to seek refuge in
another place outside his country of origin
or nationality’

29. Cartagena Declaration- Definition
Cartagena Declaration (South and Central
America)
– Places less emphasis on a fear of persecution
and more on objective conditions of violence
and disorder in the country of origin

30. Categories of “Refugees”
Identify Categories

31. categories of Refugees
Stateless persons-
– Persons who are not considered nationals of any
state under operational law
– Victims of territorial alignment – residents of
Uganda expelled by Idi Amin,
– Resident had neither Uganda or British passports
Convention Refugees (Official):
Have protection rights to seek asylum and
guarantee that they will not be repatriated
Once granted asylum permanently they enjoy
certain social and economic rights

32. Categories of Refugees
De facto refugees-
Excluded from being ad jure refugees rejected by
host country on basis of Convention
Normally victims of armed conflicts, erroneous
economic policy and natural disasters
Not protected from non-refoulement
Internally Displaced Persons:
People uprooted from their homes without
crossing national frontiers

33. Categories of Refugees
Denied refugee status protection on the
requirement that an applicant be outside their
country of his nationality
Products of revolutions and counter
revolutions – guerrilla and government forces
Economic immigrants:
Leave country because of poverty and
financial hardship/ seek better life
Do not fit in the definition of refugees

34. Categories of Refugees
Urban refugees:
Highly educated and qualified persons with
valuable talent and skills
Refugees with an urban, non-agricultural and
usually educated background who take up
residence in the city to live familiar environment
Refugees of a rural agricultural and uneducated
background who initially take up residence in a camp
but move to the city
Individual and small groups of asylum seekers who
arrive independently in the capital cities of low income
countries

35. Categories of Refugees
Criminals:
People who flee from justice and persons who
violate the law n their own country and flee from
persecution
 Do not get refugees status
Environmental Refugees:
People who no longer gain a secure livelihood in
their habitat due to drought, famine,
desertification, and other environmental problems
resulting from pressures of population, and
poverty

36. Conclusion & Discussion
What definition can be said to
be ‘ethical’ and inclusive?

37. Discussion
What definition can be said to
be ‘ethical’?
policy makers- approach to protect
Definition allow continued dialogue for
change of justification in which states can’t
avoid accountability for their protection
decisions
Refugee law- protect people unable to
access national protection but if one can
received adequate protection of human
dignity

38. Discussion
What definition can be said to
be ‘ethical’?
Conclusion: Agree with Shacknove- it is
the absence of state protection which
constitutes the full & complete negtaion of
society & basis of refugeehood
Supreme court of Canada (1993)-Refugee
law back up to the protection one expects
from his own state of which he is a national