|
UNHCR Home | 1951 Convention |
|
|
A 'Timeless' Treaty Under Attack: Gender Violence
The Convention doesn’t mention gender in its list of grounds on which refugee status is based, but there is growing recognition that gender-related violence under certain circumstances falls within the refugee definition (see box). In considering a case in 1999, Great Britain’s House of Lords determined that women could be considered “a particular social group” when persecuted because of behaviors or attitudes at odds with prevalent social mores—mores, say, that discriminate against women or accord them less legal protection than men. While the Convention is predicated on international cooperation and recognizes the need to share equitably the burdens and responsibilities of protecting refugees, it gives no prescription on how to do so. Burden-sharing has become one of the most contentious issues among receiving countries, one that involves not just people and money but competition for food, medical services, jobs, housing and the environment. Left unresolved, the issue could threaten the very existence of the international refugee protection regime. The problem of internally displaced persons—people displaced by war and generalized violence but who remain within their home countries—demands urgent action. This group now numbers between 20 and 25 million in at least 40 countries, compared with an estimated 12 million refugees. Although they may have fled their homes for the same reasons as refugees, because they have not crossed an international border, they still, at least in theory, enjoy the legal protection of their governments and so are not covered by the Refugee Convention. But given the minimal or non-existent protection accorded to most IDPs, the international community has begun considering how best to secure their rights. The growing tendency among some governments to interpret the Convention’s provisions restrictively is a reaction to the strain imposed on asylum systems by the rise in uncontrolled migration and both real and perceived abuse of those systems. Cheap international travel and global communications are prompting increasing numbers of people to abandon their homes and to try to improve their lot elsewhere, whether for economic or refugee-related reasons.
Smugglers and traffickers have launched a multi-billion dollar trade in people. Economic migrants and genuine refugees often become hopelessly entangled in the race to reach ‘promised land.’ As the distinction between the two becomes blurred, sometimes intentionally so, the rhetoric against all those perceived as ‘foreigners’ and ‘bogus refugees’ and, increasingly, against the Refugee Convention, itself, has become more barbed. There is no question that the number of those seeking asylum in developed countries increased substantially over the past two decades. In 2000, just over 400,000 persons applied for asylum in the 15 countries of the European Union (EU), double the number in 1980, but down from a high of 700,000 in 1992. With the increase in asylum seekers comes an increase in expenditures to pay for refugee status determination procedures and for the social assistance provided to asylum seekers. By one estimate, that expense among developed countries around the world reached $10 billion in 2000. When only one-quarter of asylum seekers is ultimately granted refugee status, as happened in the EU in 1999, governments balk.
|
|||||||||||
