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CIAO DATE: 04/05/07
Strengthening Protection of IDPs: The UN’s Role
by Roberta Cohen
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan drew attention to “the growing problem of internally displaced persons” (IDPs) in his 2005 report on UN reform, In Larger Freedom.1 Unlike refugees, IDPs do not cross international borders and thus have no wellestablished system of international assistance or protection. IDPs, Annan wrote, “often fall into the cracks between different humanitarian bodies.”2 Despite this acknowledgement of the predicament of IDPs, nowhere in the 2005 UN World Summit document, adopted by heads of government in September, does it spell out how to improve the UN’s ability to address the plight of the twenty to twenty-five million people uprooted within their own countries by violence, ethnic strife, and civil war.3 UN reform must encourage greater national and international involvement with IDPs by promoting the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, giving the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) a broader role with IDPs, and strengthening institutional and military arrangements to defend the physical safety of IDPs.
The millions of people caught in the midst of violent conflict without the basic necessities of life present a political and strategic concern, not to mention a profound humanitarian and human rights problem, requiring international action. Conflict and massive displacement can disrupt stability, turn countries into breeding grounds for lawlessness and terrorism, and undermine regional and international security. Whether in the Great Lakes region of Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Africa, or the Balkans, conflict and displacement have spilled over borders, overwhelming neighboring countries with large numbers of refugees and even igniting regional wars. Unless addressed, situations of displacement can create political and economic turmoil in entire regions.
The need to design a more predictable and effective international system for “internal refugees” is critical because the overall international humanitarian response system is a thoroughly inequitable one. UNHCR attends to the needs of the world’s 9.2 million refugees, and a dedicated international treaty, the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, sets forth their rights. In contrast, no organization has a global mandate to protect and assist the much larger number of IDPs, who are in far more desperate straits, when their own governments fail to do so. IDPs may be uprooted for the same reasons as refugees, but they receive markedly less international protection or assistance in most emergencies and, in some cases, they receive no help at all.
Sixty years after the Holocaust, it is time for the UN to act on the ideals upon which it was founded and to stop distancing itself from—or implementing halfhearted responses to—situations in which millions of people are forced from their homes by civil wars, deliberate governmental policies of ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, or even genocide. In his report on UN reform, Annan aptly affirmed that “the responsibility to protect” must shift to the international community when national authorities fail to provide for the welfare and security of their citizens.5 Sovereignty, he wrote, cannot be allowed to serve as a barrier when the lives of millions of men, women, and children are at risk. The World Summit document also adopted the concept of necessary UN protection, though only on a case-bycase basis.6 The current period of UN reform offers an opportune time to strengthen the international response to situations of internal displacement and develop an international system that better protects people uprooted in their own countries.
Roberta Cohen is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and Co-Director of the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement.