The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
takes a profound interest in this item. The work of the Commission
on Human Rights at its 60th Session, and in particular the appointment
of Professor Kälin as the Secretary-General's Representative
on the human rights of displaced persons was a particularly
important milestone in the evolution of international understanding
of the priority of the issue.
The vulnerabilities and rights of IDPs are a major concern for
the International Federation and for National Red Cross and
Red Crescent Societies everywhere in the world. For this reason,
we are particularly pleased by the emphasis Professor Kälin
has given to the issue of protection in his report, contained
in document E/CN.4/2005/84.
We very much agree with the reasoning he has applied to the
need for a special focus on the vulnerabilities and protection
needs of IDPs. The absence of international protection as it
is commonly understood within the context of the 1951 Convention
on Refugees by no means eliminates the validity of international
concern for the application of a high human rights standard
to IDPs and others with special needs because of their displacement
or removal from their homes.
Much of the debate about the situation of IDPs in the past has
placed the vulnerability and special needs in a conflict-related
context. We well understand that this is the context which most
often generates media attention, but we have argued for some
time that there needs to be more attention to the displacement
impact of natural disasters.
Some of our concerns have been highlighted during the recent
tsunami crisis.
There is insufficient time in this debate to offer a great deal
of detail, but it is important to record that protection issues
which have arisen, and which are being addressed by the International
Federation and its National Society members, protection from
displacement, include access to assistance, discrimination (also
in the provision of assistance), enforced relocation, sexual
and gender-based violence, safe and voluntary return or resettlement.
This is why the International Federation trusts the Commission
and Professor Kälin will take all opportunities to emphasise
the relevance of the Guiding Principles to natural disaster
situations. It is a message which we consider needs to be kept
fully in mind by all governments and all international community
officials as they do their work.
We will be working to ensure that contributions to recovery
in the wake of the tsunami crisis include strong reference to
these points for the persons displaced. In this spirit we look
forward to working with Professor Kälin to help integrate points
relevant to persons displaced by natural disasters in his important
on-going work.
In doing so, we will be pleased to make use of his report from
the working visit to the tsunami affected region in February-March
2005, and especially its recommendations on the protection of
IDPs in natural disaster situations. We agree with his broad
conclusions, and look forward to uniting the work of National
Human Rights Institutions and our National Societies on the
subject.
My delegation, in its contributions to debate under other items
during this Session, has spoken of several different entry points
to debate on discrimination. One which is of growing concern
to us and our National Society members is discrimination based
on straightforward difference, or xenophobia.
There are few groups of people more vulnerable to xenophobia
than persons who have migrated and find themselves trying to
make a livelihood in a new land, even if they are only intending
to be in that new land for a short time.
This is why we are strong supporters of the principles surrounding
the 1990 Convention on the Rights of Migrant Workers.
Migrant workers constitute a significant proportion of the much
wider group of persons living in a country other than their
own. This wider group is continuing to grow in the modern globalising
world, but much too little is being done by government to address
the consequential needs of communities and nations as demographics
change.
We have said in many other debates that Governments need to
work much more actively to enact legislation providing mainstream
human rights to those in their territory who, for one reason
or another, are not citizens.
At the same time, Governments must ensure that access to those
rights is available to persons who are not citizens. Globalisation
is not just about economies. It is also about people and their
opportunities. It is not possible to harvest the economic rewards
of globalisation without paying proper attention to the dignity
and the humanitarian quality of the persons who make those rewards
possible.
This is true in all countries. In the developed world, economies
now depend on a population with the numbers and varied skills
required for their continuing growth. It is no secret that this
growth would not be available except for migration, yet many
developed countries have yet to enact coherent migration legislation
which supports the growth.
Migration is, of course, not only a South-North movement. There
are equally compelling needs for developing countries to build
coherent legislation on migration - with the same growth objectives
as need to be fitted into that legislation in the developed
North.
In all countries, migration legislation needs to start from
the premise that population movement has been with our world
since people learned to walk, and that it will remain with us
for ever. Legislation should be designed to facilitate movement
to encourage growth, not to build walls.
Walls have many insidious effects. The permanence of the phenomenon
of human movement means that walls will not work. People will
find ways around them, often by breaking the law. This multiplies
the interest of organised crime in helping people evade law,
and contributes significantly to issues of smuggling and trafficking
which are headline issues for other United Nations institutions.
This is why we see the Office of the High Commissioner for Human
Rights as having a priority task in helping integrate human
rights concerns into the population movement debate.
We look forward to opportunities for further discussion on this
important issue in the future, and also at the national level
through contact between National Red Cross and Red Crescent
Societies with their governments, within the framework of their
relationship as auxiliaries to the public authorities in the
humanitarian field.
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