UN Hails AU Convention on Displaced Persons

(PANA) - The UN has commended the initiative taken by the African Union (AU) to draft a legal instrument for enhanced protection and assistance of persons internally displaced as a result of armed conflict in their countries.

"Such a convention, being the first binding international instrument of its kind, will set an example for other regions affected by internal displacement of their populations," said Walter Kaelin, Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons.

Speaking in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, at one-day seminar for African diplomats and international humanitarian agencies on displacements caused by armed conflict in Africa, Kaelin said it was essential to address the challenges stemming from internal displacements and to strengthen the response that national authorities take to deal with problems of the affected people.

"The issue of displacement in armed conflict is particularly important for your continent," said Kaelin, noting that nearly 13 million people were currently internally displaced within 19 African countries as a result of conflict alone.

"This means that about half of the displaced of the world live on the African continent," he said, adding that the figure did not comprise those displaced by natural disasters.

From his personal experience in Africa over the past three years, Kaelin said: " I could see for myself the huge challenges many governments have to face in trying to find appropriate solutions to the plight and the suffering of the displaced, particularly the vulnerable groups among their populations."

Legal experts from the AU Member States are due to meet at the AU headquarters from 2-6 June 2008 to finalise the Draft Convention for the Protection and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

AU ministers dealing with forced displacements will meet in July 2008 to refine the draft before it is submitted to the Executive Council and to the first ever Special Summit of Heads of State and Government on Refugees, Returnees and IDPs, scheduled to take place in November this year.

"This draft convention, together with the IDPs protocol adopted by the International Conference on the Great Lakes region, will constitute a huge step forward because for the first time the international law will contain binding provisions that are explicitly addressing internal displacement and persons affected by it," said Kaelin.

The UN official urged the African countries to ensure that this legal framework would be put into action.

"Legal experts meet here next week will have to ensure that the text does not become one of those unopened documents gathering dust in libraries but that it will be a practical instrument for addressing real issues.

"Governments will have to ensure that the new instrument does not undermine existing standards and guarantees protecting IDPs as they are already laid out and implicit in international humanitarian and international human rights law," Kaelin added.

The AU and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) jointly organised the seminar.

Meanwhile, ICRC Vice President Christine Beerli told the seminar participants that forced displacement of people within their own country had been a recurring problem for many years and was a the subject of growing concern within the international community.

"There are numerous causes of displacement—some are natural, many man-made. The consequences are tragic for the victims, large numbers of whom live on the African continent," she said.

On the planned AU summit to address the issue, Beerli noted that the event would highlight the determination of the African leaders to resolve these problems.

In 2007, she said, the ICRC provided humanitarian aid for over four million displaced people across 27 countries, half of them in Africa.

Beerli advised that the proposed AU Convention on IDPs "must clearly reiterate that strictly humanitarian and impartial operations shall not be considered hostile acts and that the parties to a conflict shall not arbitrarily withhold their consent for these activities."

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