Press release
23 September 2002

Most of the world's refugees are uprooted by warfare but never cross an
international border, says a survey published today. Some 25 million
people are now internally displaced due to conflicts that have spread
since the Cold War, according to a major new survey published today.
Internally displaced people (IDPs) are a central humanitarian challenge of
our time; outnumbering conventional refugees by two-to-one and nearly
always receiving less protection, says the four-year survey by the Global
IDP Project.

"The 2002 Global IDP Survey confirms two worrying trends: first, that
large numbers of innocent civilians are being forced from their homes by
increased insecurity in the world; and secondly, that many of these people
remain officially neglected by government authorities," said Elisabeth
Rasmusson, the project's head.

More than half of the world's displaced people are in Africa, the survey
finds, most of them (10m of 13.5m) concentrated in Sudan, Angola and
Congo. Afghanistan, Indonesia, Turkey and Colombia have over a million
each. Iraq, Azerbaijan, Sri Lanka, Burma and India have over
half-a-million each. In Burundi and Lebanon, IDPs make about 10% of the
population. Though smaller in number, IDPs in Liberia, Sierra Leone,
Guinea and Chechnya (the Russian Federation) have faced widespread human
rights abuses.

The global IDP crisis is one of the great humanitarian challenges of our
time, states the survey, noting that in most of the 48 countries covered,
IDPs struggle to survive with inadequate shelter, few resources and no
protection. Warring parties often block humanitarian aid, unnecessarily
worsening malnutrition and disease. Moreover IDPs - mainly women and
children - have no one to protect them from multiple human rights
violations: including attacks, torture, forced labour and sexual
exploitation.

National governments do little to protect IDPs because they lack resources
or political will; many IDPs are from minority groups. The international
community and donor governments, meanwhile, also pay little attention to
protection needs and underfund humanitarian programmes.

While IDPs have received more attention recently within the United
Nations, and legal guidelines exist to protect them; these efforts will
have to be greatly enhanced to improve the lives of IDPs, some of the
world's most insecure people, or respond adequately to this global crisis.

Contact Andrew Lawday for interview (English and French)
Tel: +41 (0)22 799 0703 / email: [email protected]