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Human rights andinternational legalstandards: what do reliefworkers need to know?

RE L I E F A N D RE H A B I L I T A T I O N NE T W O R KFebruary 1997

RRN

James Darcy

The concept of human rights is increasinglyinvoked in the context of humanitarianemergencies; yet the moral and legal basis

for the claims involved are often little understood.This paper aims to describe the basic moral and legalframework of human rights; to look at issues ofresponsibility, protection and enforcement in the lightof international legal obligations; and to relate thisto the work of humanitarian agencies in their attemptsto provide asssistance and protection to communitiesaffected by conflict and other disasters.

The legal framework involves a sometimes confusingpatchwork of provisions from different branches ofinternational law: human rights law, humanitarianlaw (the Geneva Conventions), and refugee law. Thekey features of these provisions, and the way theyrelate to each other, are explored in this paper. Morespecifically, the particular role and mandate of the

ICRC and of UNHCR are examined in the contextof a discussion of humanitarian law and refugee lawrespectively. From that follows a general discussionof protection and assistance activities, the relationshipbetween them, and the tensions and potentialdilemmas that arise in seeking to combine humanrights advocacy with relief assistance.

The basic thesis is that humanitarian actions –assistance and protection – are properly seen as partof a spectrum of human rights activity; in otherwords, it is an argument for the recognition ofhumanitarian rights in the broader sense, includingbut not limited to relief. The paper concludes witha number of recommendations, including a call tomake an assessment of protection needs part of everyneeds assessment, and to calculate and minimise thepotential negative side-effects of relief interventions.

Abstract

Please send comments on this paper to:

Relief and Rehabilitation NetworkOverseas Development InstitutePortland HouseStag PlaceLondon SW1E 5DPUnited KingdomTel: +44 (0) 171 393 1674/47Fax: +44 (0) 171 393 1699Email: rrn@odi.org.ukWeb site: http://www.oneworld.org/odi/rrn/index.html

A copy will be sent to the authors.

Comments received may be used in future Newsletters.

ISBN: 0-85003-249-0

Price per copy: £5.00 (excluding postage and packing)

© Overseas Development Institute, London, 1997.

Photocopies of all or part of this publication may be made providing that the source isacknowledged. Requests for commercial reproduction of Network material should be directedto ODI as copyright holders. The Network Coordinator would appreciate receiving details ofany use of this material in training, research or programme design, implementation orevaluation.

1. Introduction 5

2. Different traditions: human rights and humanitarianism 7

3. Moral and legal rights 9

4. Human rights in law 12

5. Responsibility for protection and enforcement 15

6. Human rights in armed conflict 23

7. Human rights, refugees and internal displacement 27

8. Protection and assistance 32

9. Conclusion and recommendations 34

Endnotes 37

Bibliography 38

Boxes

Box 1 United Nations Charter 19Box 2 Rights and Freedoms in the Covenant on Civil and

Political Rights 1966 20Box 3 International Covenant on Economic, Social and

Cultural Rights 1966 21Box 4 Extracts from 1948 Convention on the Prevention and

Punishment of the Crime of Genocide 22Box 5 Article 3, common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 25

Contents

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5

Introduction

1

We all use the phrase human rights.It is so familiar that we tend toassume that its meaning is

understood and accepted. It is a useful phrase:it carries a certain moral force and acts as akind of ‘trump card’ in arguments about moralbehaviour. But do we really understand thenature of human rights claims, and the basison which they are founded?

The concept of human rights is increasinglybeing invoked in the context of humanitarianrelief, often in reaction to the frustration ofattempts to bring relief assistance to civilianpopulations caught up in armed conflict. Thepeople concerned, it is said, have a right toassistance. Sometimes is claimed that externalagencies have a right to deliver that assistance.Others stress the right of the people affectedto protection from violence by reason of theircivilian status. Threats to their security andwell-being posed by the warring parties aredescribed in terms of human rights abuse ordenial – though the need to negotiate safeaccess with those same parties for the provisionof relief is often felt to be incompatible inpractice with public denunciation of abuse.

In whatever forum they are made, the claimsdescribed above are forms of human rightsadvocacy: the assertion of rights on behalf ofpeople whose rights are threatened and whomay be unable to assert them for themselves.This paper is written in the belief that for thoseengaged humanitarian work, it is essential tobe familiar with the relevant human rightsstandards and the legal provisions whichcodify them. It is argued below thathumanitarian action can and should be rootedin human rights principles. But no agencywhich professes a commitment to humanrights can afford to be ignorant of the relevantstandards if it is to engage in more than emptyrhetoric.

This argument is partly a reflection of ageneral concern with defining and achievingminimum standards of humanitarian response;and attempts to define a kind of ‘humanitariancharter’ setting out what, as a minimum,people have a right to expect. The aim is toestablish a consistent measure ofaccountability for the actions of humanitarianagencies. The achievement of that aim willinvolve recognition of states’ and others’

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6

responsibilities, and agencies working to moreclearly defined roles – embracing the work ofrelief agencies, those engaged in protectionactivities in the field, and the advocacy workof human rights agencies. Consistentapplication of human rights standards, it isargued, can provide a framework which unitesthese activities, helps answer apparentdilemmas – and relates humanitarian actionto development initiatives. For thoseconcerned with the protection of conflict-affected populations, there is a potentiallyconfusing patchwork of provisions fromdifferent branches of international law:human rights, humanitarian, and refugee.

The purpose of this paper, therefore, is three-fold:

1. To attempt to sketch the basic moral andlegal framework of human rights.

2. To look at issues of responsibility,protection and enforcement in the lightof international legal obligations.

3. To relate this to the work ofhumanitarian agencies in their attemptsto provide assistance and protection tocommunities affected by conflict andother disasters.

A wide view is taken of human rights law, sothat international humanitarian law (theGeneva Conventions etc.) and refugee law areincluded under this heading. A related andsubsidiary aim of this paper is to examine therole and mandate of two agencies concernedspecifically with these areas of law:respectively, the ICRC and UNHCR. Adiscussion of the connection betweenprotection and assistance activities followsfrom this.

Some of what follows is a statement of fact;some of it is a matter of interpretation, onwhich feedback would be welcome. In a paperof this length, of course, it not possible to coverthese subjects in depth. The author iscurrently engaged in producing a manual forOxfam UK/I which covers the subject in somedetail and which provides a guide to relevanthuman rights and other legal provisions.Many materials already exist on the individualtopics under discussion: for a short list ofrecommended reading, please see thebibliography at the end of the paper.

The author works for Oxfam UK/I as Emergencies Coordinator for Asia. He is also a UK-qualified lawyer. This paper has been written in his personal capacity, and the views expressedin it are not necessarily those of Oxfam UK/I.

jdarcy@oxfam.org.ukc/o Oxfam UK/I, 274 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7DU, UK.

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7

Different traditions:human rights andhumanitarianism

2

The modern concept of human rights canbe traced back to the American andFrench revolutions in the late eighteenth

century. The ‘rights of man’ were assertedand justified by reference to principles ofliberty and equality. Though sometimesdistorted, the concept can be traced throughsubsequent history in the emancipationmovement and the abolition of the slave tradethrough to the developments of this century,including the founding of the United Nationsand the formulation of international legalstandards based on the principles set out inthe Universal Declaration of Human Rightsof 1948.

The development of universal human rightsin the twentieth century has been spurred bytwo main factors: the atrocities committedagainst civilians and non-combatants in thetwo World Wars, above all in the Holocaust;and the persecution and violent suppressionof opponents of totalitarian or colonialregimes. Loss or denial of liberty anddemocratic expression has been a commonfeature of both, as has discrimination – adenial of equality – in the form of political,

social and economic marginalisation. Theprinciple of non- discrimination lies at theheart of human rights; that is, the principlethat differences of race, sex and other humancharacteristics, or differences of belief orculture, cannot justify differential treatment.Genocide can be seen as the ultimate form ofdiscrimination, treating human beings as sub-human.

The process of defining and givinginternational recognition to human rights hasinvolved, to some extent, a pulling back ofthe curtain of sovereignty. It is a recognitionthat the previous basis on which internationalrelations rested – absolute respect for nationalsovereignty and a reluctance to question astate’s behaviour towards individuals withinits territory – provided insufficient safeguards.The recognition of individuals as ‘subjects’of international law, and so of internationalconcern, was a revolutionary step. That said,it can be seen as a recognition that statesovereignty, which remains the corner-stoneof international law and relations, has twoaspects. It carries with it both rights andduties, and the duties of the state include, as a

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8

minimum, the protection of the human rightsof those within its sovereign jurisdiction.Failure to do so may call into question a state’ssovereign rights, and so its very legitimacy.

The concept of state (and so government)responsibility remains at the heart of humanrights, and will be stressed throughout thispaper. But human rights responsibilities gobeyond the state, and we shall look at this issuebelow. The mainstream of the rights traditionhas tended to place the greatest value onliberty, and to assume that, left to live theirown lives, people will thrive. It is only inlater years that more positive claims have beenmade on the state, a recognition that libertymay be of little value if accompanied bydisabling poverty.

The humanitarian tradition – if it can be calleda single tradition – has been more obviouslyconcerned with basic human needs. It is anolder tradition, impossible to date – it isevident even in Homer’s Iliad , the bloodiestof epics, but is by no means an exclusively‘western’ phenomenon. It has a history inIslam, Christianity, Buddhism and otherreligions. Of particular concern have beensituations of armed conflict where adefenceless individual requires urgentassistance and protection from the effects ofa conflict in which they are playing no directpart. The Red Cross movement, governed byprinciples of neutrality and impartiality, is theclearest expression of this tradition, and thedevelopment of international humanitarianlaw which it sponsored has gone some way toestablishing humanitarian action on a set ofrights. The widely-shared belief in theexistence of a humanitarian imperative impliesa duty to act in the face of human suffering,without assigning more specific rights andduties. Whatever the basis for relief activities– and certainly the motivation for them is mosteasily described in terms of compassion andthe desire to relieve suffering in fellow humanbeings – they are today to a great extentdelegated to specialised relief agencies,governmental and others. The way in whichthis function is performed is increasingly

being called into question, as are the ethics ofproviding relief assistance in complex politicalemergencies.One of the purposes of this paper is to suggestthat a rights analysis can provide a basis foraddressing the ethical questions involved inproviding humanitarian assistance, and forclarifying the roles and responsibilities of theagencies concerned. This implies that the twotraditions sketched above can be closelyrelated.

There is one obvious link between thetraditions: both are universal in theirapplication, and based on a recognition thatour shared humanity makes certain demandson us. Both, too, can be linked to an analysisof human need, though human rights are morebroadly conceived to include all those aspectsof an individual’s physical, economic, politicaland social security which it is believedessential to safeguard in any society. Butwhereas humanitarianism has tended to relyon an impulse of private charity, human rightshave always had a public and political aspect.It is this aspect of human rights which hassometimes caused relief workers to view themwarily – coupled with the fear thatinvolvement in such issues will jeopardise theirrelief activities. That said, the provision ofrelief itself has increasingly been recognisedas having, to a greater or lesser extent, apolitical dimension.

The argument of this paper is thathumanitarian actions should themselves beseen as one part of a spectrum of human rightsactivities: that assistance and protection areclosely related activities that can and shouldbe justified in human rights terms. Reliefassistance can be described in terms of thefulfilment of certain claims that human rightsmake on us. This may be a different type ofactivity to advocacy aimed at preventing theabuse or denial of human rights; but they areclearly related. This will be taken up againbelow. What we shall look at before then isthe nature of the claims that human rightsmake, what the corresponding duties are, andwho is responsible for fulfilling them.

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9

Moral and legalrights

3

What is a right? One dictionarydefinition describes it as ajustifiable claim, on legal or moral

grounds, to have or obtain something, or toact in a certain way’.1 It is useful to think ofrights as valid claims or entitlements, whichmay be moral or legal, that one party makesagainst another. Human rights can bedescribed as claims that we all have simplyby virtue of our humanity. But what do thoseclaims consist of, and from whom can we claimthem? The history of human rights has beenone of defining the claims in question, and ofdefining the corresponding duties. If there isa single rationale underlying all human rights,it is perhaps the need, on the one hand, tosecure individual and group interests againstthe potential threats and limitations of livingin society; and, on the other hand, to ensurethat all individuals and groups share thebenefits of living in society.

Human rights are fundamentally moral claims.Though much of what follows is concernedwith the legal form in which those rights havebeen codified, the law did not create the rights:it recognises that individuals have such

(moral) rights and involves formal (legal)undertakings by states to ensure that thoserights are respected. They remain fairly broadprinciples, and it is important to realise thatthey constitute a set of essential minimumsafeguards that should not be stretched beyondtheir core meaning. Nor are they alwaysabsolute rights. The limits set on humanrights and freedoms are those necessary toensure that the rights of others are notthemselves infringed, or to ensure the securityof society and the state.

What sorts of claim do human rights involve?It may help to look at the list [Boxes 2 and 3on pages 20 and 21 respectively], which setsout a summary of the rights in the two mainglobal human rights conventions. The civiland political rights make roughly three sortsof claim. First, they make ‘liberty’ claims: tobe left alone, not to be interfered with, to beallowed to act as one wishes, individually andin community. So for example, the rights tofreedom of speech, freedom of movement andfreedom of association. Second, they makeclaims to recognition of civil, legal andpolitical status from which flow certain

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10

safeguards and rights of political and legalaccess – hence for example the right to a fairtr ial. Third, and crucially, are variousprohibitions mostly framed as ‘freedomsfrom’: these include the right of freedom fromtorture.

The right to life itself probably belongs in thislast group. Until recently it was interpretedin negative terms: the right not to be arbitrarilydeprived of one’s life. More recently therehave been moves in the UN to expand itsinterpretation to encompass a duty to takepositive steps to preserve life – a developmentof obvious relevance to relief workers. Theoriginal interpretation remains of particularrelevance for civilians in conflict.

The economic, social and cultural rightsinclude a number of claims that are of adifferent type: they are claims to socialsecurity and a certain standard of living,including claims to adequate food, clothing,housing, health care, and education. Theduties accepted by states to achieve fulfilmentof these rights are of a more qualified sort(see section 4); but these rights should be ofcentral concern to humanitarian anddevelopment workers. This set of rights –sometimes called ‘second generation’ rights– addresses the issue of poverty, as the firstgeneration addressed the issue of threats toliberty. The failure to make progress on thefulfilment of these rights, and indeed the lackof international commitment to theirfulfilment, has been one of the chief failingsof the human rights movement. It is reflectedin the language used: we talk about humanrights abuse, even human rights denial; butperhaps we should talk also of human rightsneglect. Denial or neglect, accompanied bydiscrimination, is the cause not only of chronicsuffering but potentially also of armedconflict and its humanitarian consequences.

It would be wrong to characterise this secondset of rights as welfare claims by passiverecipients. They do imply certain welfareentitlements where individuals andcommunities lack the ability to securesubsistence needs for themselves. But just asimportantly, they are about equitable access

and the creation of conditions where people(individually and collectively) can pursueviable livelihoods and satisfy their own needs.It is in this respect that they are most obviouslylinked to the first generation rights, and whythe two sets are rightly said to be indivisible.The concept of justice, in its concern with dueprocess on the one hand and with fairdistribution of goods on the other, may be saidto link the two strands. So do the relatedconcepts of non-discrimination andconsistency of treatment.

If human rights are claims, who are theyclaims against? In legal terms, they areframed as claims against the state: and(crucially) most states have recognised thevalidity of those claims by ratifying humanrights treaties and so formally accepting theirobligation to respect and ensure the rights inquestion to all within their territory and subjectto their jurisdiction.

In moral terms, human rights are claims weall have against everyone else; that is, theyare not restricted to the relationship betweenstate and individual. Since humanitarianagencies are likely to base their advocacy asmuch on moral as on legal grounds, it isimportant to say that (for example) a rebelmovement may with equal justification beaccused of human rights abuse as maygovernment forces, even though they are notparty to the relevant conventions. It is justthe terms in which the argument is made thatmay differ.

Human rights claims are universal in that, ifthey are valid at all, they are valid foreveryone, since they are based on generalassumptions about human needs andcapacities. But are those claims – and thecorresponding duties – universally recognisedand equally respected? The answer is no,though the differences tend to arise less froma fundamental clash of cultural values thanfrom a difference of emphasis. Certainly, forexample, in Islamic states, duty has tended tobe stressed over rights, human rights beingseen in the light of the overriding duty to obeyGod’s law. In Asia, second generation rightshave tended to be prioritised over first

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11

generation. In Africa, talk about rights hastended to focus on the collective (‘thirdgeneration’) rights to self-determination ordevelopment as much as on the rights ofindividuals.

The human rights code drawn up after theSecond World War reflected the ideologicaldifferences between East and West. The twosets of rights discussed above themselvescontain the seeds of ideological difference: thefirst generation stressing individual libertyand seeming to require adherence todemocratic principles; the second implyinguniversal minimum welfare entitlements, andarguably requiring a redistribution of wealthwithin and between states. If the ideologicaldebate has now shifted to one between Northand South, the substance of the debate remainsfairly constant: civil and political versuseconomic and social rights, individual versus

collective interests, liberty versus equality.The differences of emphasis sometimesthreaten to break the consensus that thespectrum of human rights is ‘indivisible andinterdependent’. But for the reasons indicatedabove, the principle is a vital one, andtranscends differences of political ideology.Human rights law fulfils the useful functionof providing evidence of consensus aboutrights among states and between cultures. Thatconsensus generates both moral and politicalpressure on other states to adopt the samestandards. We may be wary of the use bypoliticians of human rights as an ideological‘battering ram’, and recognise legitimateproblems of implementation; but in the end acommitment to human rights implies awillingness to pursue advocacy (in whateverform) to champion those rights and to preventbreaches.

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Human rights in law

4

The first place to look for legal protectionof human rights is in national legislationand the law enforcement mechanisms

of the state. Most human rights safeguards thatexist will be found here: for example, lawsagainst murder reflect the right to life, one ofmany human rights principles that pre-date themodern human rights movement. The law ofhabeas corpus (freedom from unjustifieddetention) is another example. Some of themost fundamental rights are protected in stateconstitutions, of which the most famous andthe most common model is the USConstitution and Bill of Rights.

So why concentrate on international law? Notbecause protection against human rights abuseis best pursued at the international level: it isnot. But international human rights law,founded on the principles set out in theUniversal Declaration of Human Rights in1948, formulates legal standards to which stateparties to the relevant conventions havecommitted themselves. These have an externaland an internal aspect. In their external aspect,they amount to a set of binding undertakingsto other state parties in respect of the

observance and protection of human rights.In their internal aspect, they involve anequivalent undertaking to the holders of therights, that is, to every individual within thestate’s jurisdiction. In becoming party to ahuman rights treaty, a state undertakes toensure that its national policies and legislationconform to the relevant standards, and toguarantee to individuals effective remedy forabuse. So international law sets standardswhich are to be implemented through nationalpolicies and legislation. It provides a blue-print by which to judge national legislation,as well as a state’s behaviour towards all thosewithin its territory.

That, of course, is the theory. In practice,abusive behaviour not only goes unpunishedbut is in many cases actually perpetrated bythe state through its agents (police, army etc.).In other words, the very body whichundertakes to protect human rights, and ischarged with that responsibility, may beunable to provide protection or may itself bethe source of the threat. That threat may beovert or covert; and it may be posed by (forexample) measures which are grossly

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13

discriminatory against one section of thepopulation. We shall look below at issues ofinternational protection in the context ofrefugees and asylum. But most who sufferhuman rights abuse must look for protectionin situ The responsibility of the state and ofother parties in respect of human rights, andthe issues of protection and enforcement, areexamined in the next section.

Human rights are only one part ofinternational law, though an increasinglysignificant part. International law concernsitself with inter-state relations. Primarilythrough the mechanism of treaties to whichstates put their name, it imposes duties onthose states in respect of all the other partiesto the same treaty. Strictly speaking, therefore,a state party to a human rights treaty owes itsobligation in international law not to theindividuals whose rights are to be protectedbut to the other state parties. This is reflectedin the fact that individuals have very restrictedaccess to international mechanisms in seekinga remedy for abuse.

Certain principles of law become establishedby consistent state practice over time as rulesof ‘customary’ international law, binding onall states regardless of whether they explicitlyendorse them. The content of customary lawis less certain than treaty law, but it includesgeneral humanitarian principles of which (forexample) the Geneva Conventions are anelaboration.

International law is peculiar in beingessentially consensual, and is very differentin a number of other ways from national law.First, there is no single law-making body,though in respect of human rights at least theUN has tended to play that role. Second, thereis no single court which has universaljurisdiction to rule authoritatively on any issueof international law: the International Courtof Justice, for example, has jurisdiction onlyif the states in dispute have agreed that itshould have. Third, there is no universalenforcement mechanism: the business ofjudgment and enforcement has tended to beleft to states and to be dictated by politicalfactors. The inconsistency of states in

performing this function is illustrated by theresolutions of the UN Security Council, whosepolicing role in imposing sanctions orauthorising the use of force against errantstates has become much more prominent inthe years since the ending of the Cold War.

The fundamentally political nature ofinternational law and of its methods ofjudgment and enforcement is one of itsinherent characteristics. It is essentially aboutprotecting the interests of sovereign states, andin that respect its concern with human rightsis anomalous. That said, human rights areincreasingly used as the yardstick to judgestate behaviour. It is essential to the consistentapplication of human rights standards thatthose bodies which are not driven by state-political agendas should keep states to thecommitments they have made.

Ultimately, however, the realisation of humanrights depends on their being known, valuedand insisted on by those who hold them.Education is one aspect of this. So too arechannels of free expression and forms ofrepresentative and responsive government.The role of independent investigativejournalists and others concerned with humanrights monitoring may be crucial in thisrespect.

There is not space here to run through all therelevant human rights treaties, but some mustbe mentioned. The UN Charter [see Box 1 onpage 19] – to which almost all states are party– contains important general undertakings inrespect of human rights but did not spell outthose rights. The 1948 Universal Declarationof Human Rights filled that gap, and remainsa blue-print for international human rights, butit was not itself a legally binding instrument.It was not until the twin InternationalCovenants of 1966 – one covering Civil andPolitical Rights, the other Economic, Socialand Cultural rights – that legal form was givento the declaration of intent.

Various other instruments, before and since,have given legal protection against specificabuses. The Genocide Convention (1948) [seeBox 4 on page 22] remains sadly relevant

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14

today, though states have failed to live up totheir individual and collective responsibilityto ‘prevent and punish’ genocide, surely theultimate abuse of human rights. Otherconventions elaborate on the generalprohibitions against torture (1984) and slavery(various). Racial discrimination anddiscrimination against women are the subjectof treaties signed in 1966 and 1978respectively. More recently, the Conventionon the Rights of the Child (1989), whichelaborates on the general provision for theprotection of children, has proved its value ina number of different contexts. [seeforthcoming Network Paper 21 by Iain LevineHumanitarian Principles: the South Sudanexperience].

Of the other relevant treaties, it is importantto mention the regional human rightsconventions and mechanisms in Europe, LatinAmerica and Africa. (There is no equivalentin Asia.) The provisions of these treaties arebroadly in line with those in the global humanrights treaties.

Both the global and regional conventions havecorresponding review mechanisms, thoughonly in two cases – the European and Inter-American human rights courts – do theseinclude effective judicial mechanisms. Thenature and workings of the UN and regionalhuman rights bodies are beyond the scope ofthis paper. They provide a more or lesseffective mechanism for scrutinising states’performance against their international legalobligations. The sanctions against failure arelargely politically determined. For the mostpart, it is unrealistic to expect urgentprotection issues to be dealt with effectivelythrough these bodies. But their work, informedby reports from human rights and otherorganisations, is an important part of thestandard setting function of their respectiveparent organisations. The appointment of aUN High Commissioner for Human Rights hasraised hopes (as yet unfulfilled) that humanrights protection will come higher on memberstates’ agendas.

Some final remarks before going on. First,not all states are signatories of the global

treaties mentioned above, and it is clearlyimportant to be aware of whether human rightscase law is based on explicit legalundertakings or simply on moral obligation.In making a case on legal grounds, we havethe advantage of quoting states’ own wordsback to them.

Second, in certain circumstances, states arepermitted to ‘derogate from’ (suspend orlimit) the application of legal human rightsguarantees. Derogation is only permissiblein time of public emergency which threatensthe life of the nation. Any such measures mustbe officially proclaimed, be non-discriminatory, and be limited to the extent‘strictly required by the exigencies of thesituation’. Crucially, certain rights can neverbe derogated from: the right to life, to freedomof thought, to recognition as a person beforethe law; freedom from torture etc., fromslavery, from imprisonment for debt, and fromprosecution under retroactive criminal laws.

Third, subject to derogation, human rights lawscontinue to apply during armed conflict. Weshall look below at how these standards aresupplemented by the provisions ofinternational humanitarian law (the GenevaConventions and Protocols), which is aseparate but related strand of law. Humanrights standards apply to refugees andinternally displaced as well; though in the caseof refugees, specific provision is made byinternational refugee law. This, again, is aseparate but related branch of law, and isdiscussed below.

Finally, a word on how the content of humanrights law relates to humanitarian relief. Wehave said that the human rights tradition hasnot placed concern with meeting immediatebasic needs at its centre. Outside humanitarianlaw, the rights foundation for relief assistanceis founded mainly on the right to life on theone hand and the principles set out in theEconomic Covenant on the other. The latterstates the principle that everyone has a rightto adequate food, shelter and clothing; tofreedom from hunger; and to the highestattainable standard of physical and mentalhealth. The obligations it sets to achieve these

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15

aims are binding on states collectively.Though these are framed in conditional terms,to be fulfilled progressively dependent onresources, they remain the right of theindividual.

The right to life implies an immediatecommitment to protection. This is interpretedby the UN Human Rights Committee as a dutynot just to refrain from and protect againstarbitrary deprivation of life – e.g. summaryexecution – but more positively to take stepsto avoid preventable loss of life. This would

apply to the lives of civilians in time ofconflict. But it would include, for example,an obligation to vaccinate children againstserious communicable diseases. It can alsobe taken to include, without stretching themeaning, an obligation to provide relief, or atleast to allow relief to be provided, wherepeople’s lives are under threat for want of basicneeds. The ‘right of humanitarian access’ isbest framed in terms of the fulfilment of aduty to provide relief, a duty correspondingto the individual’s right to life, to food, toshelter, and so on.

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16

Responsibility forprotection andenforcement

5

I n legal terms, responsibility for protectinghuman rights lies with the state first andforemost. This remains true even where

the state’s agents are themselves the abusingparties, or are unable to provide the necessaryprotection against threats to human rightsposed by third parties. Specific responsibilitiesare vested in the state’s agents –administration, legislature, courts, police,army, civil servants – all of whose activitieshave a bearing on the protection and fulfilmentof human rights. To some extent this is aquestion of maintaining ‘law and order’, withthe qualification that the law must govern theactivities of the state’s own agents, and mustitself satisfy the requirements of justice.

Beyond national boundaries, failure to complywith human rights obligations amounts to abreach by the offending state of itsundertakings to other states. Moreover, theUN Charter (articles 55 & 56, see Box 1 onpage 19) requires of its member states thatthey take joint and separate action to ensureobservance of human rights. The internationalcommunity therefore has a legal commitmentto the protection of human rights where they

are not otherwise protected by the state. Thedifficulties of providing internationalprotection in such circumstances are notorious– witness the ‘safe areas’ initiative in formerYugoslavia – and most such efforts take theform of external pressure aimed at ensuringthat the state itself fulfils its obligations.Increasingly the use or threat of sanctions orthe suspension of trade concessions are usedin an attempt to apply leverage on theoffending state. Making aid transfersconditional on human rights performance fallsin the same category.

The problems with such approaches are wellknown: while humanitarian assistance isgenerally exempted, economic penalties tendto hit the poorest hardest and may have littleimpact on government policy; they tend tofocus exclusively on civil and political rightsperformance to the exclusion of economic andsocial rights; and they tend to be part of anideological package that insists on economicand other reforms which go beyond (or maycontradict) the dictates of human rights. Suchmeasures have a mixed record of success inforcing reform, and have notoriously failed

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17

as a method of dislodging dictators. They are,in any case, applied ad hoc and inconsistentlyby the industrialised states. The pursuit ofnational (strategic) interest remains thedriving force of international relations, but isan insecure foundation for the enforcement ofhuman rights.

The threat of public denunciation, or denialof diplomatic privileges, is probably a greaterdeterrent than is generally recognised. Acritical report from one of the UN humanrights bodies is at least a severeembarrassment to the government concerned,and may have political repercussions at thedomestic as well as the international level(opposition parties seise such opportunities).States will go to great lengths to forestall suchcriticism. Alas, the UN’s mechanisms tend tobe slow, and its monitoring functions limitedin capacity. The monitoring and advocacyactivities of NGOs are often crucial in alertingthe international community to abusescommitted behind the veil of nationalsovereignty.

The UN Security Council may order theimposition of sanctions, and ultimately evenarmed intervention, under Chapter VII of theCharter; but in keeping with the primarypurpose of the UN, the rationale for suchmeasures is the removal of a threat to worldpeace and security. It is much debated whetherarmed intervention for the purposes ofproviding humanitarian relief or protectinghuman rights can be legitimate under theCharter, given the provisions of Article 2 [seeBox 1 on page 19]. There is a generalpresumption against violation of statesovereignty, though few would disagree thatexceptions exist: intervention to preventgenocide, for example, is not only legitimatebut is in effect required of the internationalcommunity under the Genocide Convention[see Box 4 on page 22]. Action to preventother gross abuses of human rights or crimesagainst humanity can be argued to fall in thesame category.

The recent examples of internationalintervention in Iraqi Kurdistan, Somalia andThe Former Yugoslavia do not provide a

convincing basis for a precedent ofhumanitarian intervention by force. Inparticular, the mandate and practice of the UN-sanctioned intervention forces in the last twocases call into question the description of suchinterventions as essentially ‘humanitarian’ incharacter. The delivery of relief in suchcircumstances, while essential, is only part ofthe humanitarian picture. The protection givento the civilian population from the effects ofconflict, indeed the cessation of conflict itself,are issues which the focus on relief havetended to mask.

In the absence of a global enforcementmechanism, the combination of such disparatemechanisms and measures as those outlinedabove may be the only form of protectionwhich the international community canprovide. Current proposals for a standinginternational criminal court, along the linesof the recent special tribunals for Rwanda andformer Yugoslavia, would if adopted go someway to remedying the situation: but withoutthe political will to enforce its judgments itwould suffer the same weaknesses as have (todate) hampered those tribunals, and could havelittle deterrent effect.

The protection activities of humanitarian andhuman rights agencies consist in identifyingthreats to human rights and then seeking toensure that the responsible authorities fulfiltheir obligation to protect against thosethreats. This depends both on clearly locatingresponsibility for the protection of humanrights – which as we have seen may lie atvarious levels – and for identifying thecompetent parties. If the party with primaryresponsibility is unable or unwilling to providethe necessary protection, or is itself theabusing power, then the responsibility of otherparties may need to be invoked. Ultimatelythis may involve the international community.The genocide in Rwanda in 1994, orchestratedby a government against a section of its ownpeople, was a catastrophic failure of protectionas well as being a crime against humanity. Theinternational community must accept itsresponsibility for the failure to prevent ithappening, as the Joint Evaluation ofEmergency Assistance to Rwanda (JEEAR)

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18

pointed out. It is one thing to plead inabilityto respond; it is quite another to denyresponsibility.

Governments here stand as representative ofthe state, and bear the relevant responsibilities.But the bodies which in practice are theprotecting (and potentially abusing) powersinclude ministries, local government, courts,law enforcement agencies, armed forces, andthe individuals who staff them. Decisions aremade by individuals, and it is with individualsthat negotiation takes place. Of course, anindividual may fear no sanction for an abuseof human rights, or for failure to prevent suchabuse. But one of the assumptions on whichadvocacy is pursued is that the individualrecognises and understands the duties that gowith his or her office. If the advocatesthemselves lack that understanding, thechances of success are reduced. Knowledgeof the basic provisions of human rights,humanitarian law and refugee law, is anessential part of that understanding.

What about abuse by non-government agents?Though humanitarian law imposes duties onsuch parties, human rights law does not. Themoral case against abuse remains unchanged,of course. But more than that, internationalhuman rights law sets standards for whichuniversal respect should be promoted, and theobservance of which has a bearing on claimsto legitimacy. The desire for legitimacy (orat least respectability) will often be theprimary motivation behind compliance with

human rights standards. This has a bearingon the conduct of rebel movements aspiringto a share in government, for example, as wellas on the conduct of governments and theiragents.

Where state structures are themselvesbreaking down, and in the case of ‘weak’ stateslacking any effective centre of sovereignauthority, the issue of human rights observanceis particularly relevant and particularlyintractable. It is certainly not always true thatdesire for respectability is a motivating factor,especially where the chain of command isweakened to the point of virtual anarchy.Recent attempts in South Sudan (described inthe forthcoming Network Paper 21 by IainLevine, Humanitarian Principles: the SouthSudan experience) to secure respect by allparties for the provisions of internationalhumanitarian law and the Convention on theRights of the Child provide a potentiallyimportant precedent. The adoption of ‘jointoperating principles’ by INGOs operating inLiberia – which include as a central concernthe promotion of respect for humanitarian andhuman rights principles – is an example of asimilar initiative. It remains to be seenwhether initiatives of this sort will be aneffective force for the protection of civilians.The ICRC has long experience in suchcircumstances, with results that are hard toassess. We shall discuss in the next sectionhow such efforts relate to the realities of armedconflict.

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19

BOX 1United Nations Charter: selected provisions

From the Preamble:

“We the peoples of the United Nations determined ... to save succeeding generations fromthe scourge of war ... to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity andworth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large andsmall, and to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arisingfrom treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and to promotesocial progress and better standards of life in larger freedom ... ... have resolved to combineour efforts to accomplish these aims.”

Article 1“The Purposes of the United Nations are:

1. To maintain international peace and security;2. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal

rights and self-determination of peoples;3. To achieve international cooperation in solving international problems of an economic,

social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respectfor human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race,sex, language, or religion; and

4. To be a centre for harmonising the actions of nations in the attainment of these commonends.”

Article 2“The Organisation and its Members, in pursuit of the Purposes stated in Article 1, shall actin accordance with following Principles:

1. The Organisation is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of its members;4. All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of

force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in anyother manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations;

7. Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorise the United Nations to intervenein matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any State or shallrequire Members to submit such matters to settlement under the present Charter; butthis principle shall not prejudice the application of enforcement measures under Chapter VII.”

Article 55 (under Chapter IX: International Economic and Social Cooperation)“... the United Nations shall promote: (a) higher standards of living, full employment, andconditions of economic and social progress and development; (b) solutions of internationaleconomic, social, health, and related problems; and international cultural and educationalco-operation; and (c) universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamentalfreedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion.”

Article 56“All Members pledge themselves to take joint and separate action in cooperation with theOrganisation for the achievement of the purposes set forth in Article 55.”

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20

BOX 2Rights & freedoms in the Covenant on Civil and

Political Rights 1966 (in abbreviated form)

Rights: (to live or be treated in a certain way; recognition of status)to life (Article 6)to liberty and security of person (9)to humane treatment as a prisoner (10)to a fair trial etc. (14)to privacy etc. (17)to protection as a child (24)to be given a vote and take part in public affairs (25)to equal treatment, protection and recognition before the law including presumption ofinnocence and right of appeal (14, 16 & 26)

Freedoms of... or to... (active freedoms - rights of non-interference)of movement / choice of residence (12)of thought, conscience and religion (18)of opinion and of expression (19)of peaceful assembly (21)of association (22)to marry freely and found a family (23)(of individuals belonging to minorities) to practice own culture, religion and language,in community with other members of their group (27)

Freedoms from... (rights not to be treated in a certain way - protection from...)from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (7)from slavery, servitude and forced labour (8)from imprisonment for debt etc. (11)from arbitrary expulsion (as an alien) (13)from prosecution under retroactive criminal law (15)

Prohibition of propaganda for war, or advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred thatconstitute incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence (20)

Notes:1. These rights are to be ensured to all individuals within the State’s territory and subject

to its jurisdiction, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language,religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or otherstatus. (2)

2. Derogation from these rights is only permissible in time of public emergency whichthreatens the life of the nation. Any such measures must be officially proclaimed, benon-discriminatory, and be limited ‘to the extent strictly required by the exigencies ofthe situation’. Certain rights can never be derogated from: the right to life, to freedomof thought, and to recognition as a person before the law; and freedom from tortureetc., from slavery, from imprisonment for debt, and from prosecution under retroactivecriminal laws.

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21

BOX 3International Covenant on Economic, Social and

Cultural Rights 1966 - summary of rights

Article 2(1) Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take steps, individuallyand through international assistance and cooperation, especially economic and technical,to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the fullrealisation of the rights recognised in the present Covenant by all appropriate means,including particularly the adoption of legislative measures.

Rights recognised (summary):

to work (Article 6)to fair pay and conditions (7)to join trade unions and strike (8)to social security (9)to protection of the family, particularly mothers and children (10)to an adequate standard of living including adequate food, clothing and housing etc.(11)to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health (12)to education (13)to participate in cultural life and enjoy the benefits of scientific progress (15)(of ‘peoples’) to enjoy and utilise fully and freely their natural wealth and resources(25)

Notes

1. Note that Art. 2(3) allows an exception to the overriding principle of non-discrimination in Art. 2(2), in that developing countries are given discretion as tothe extent to which the economic rights recognised under the Covenant should beguaranteed to non-nationals , having due regard to human rights and their nationaleconomy.

2. N.B. Art. 11(2) “The State Parties ... recognising the fundamental right of everyoneto be free from hunger [shall take the measures needed] to ensure an equitabledistribution of world food supplies in relation to need.”

3. There is no provision in the Economic Covenant for derogation from the rights andduties that it recognises.

4. There is no right to own property in the Covenants, as there had been in the Univer-sal declaration of Human Rights. Nor is there recognition in the Covenants, orelsewhere, of a ‘right to land’.

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BOX 4Extracts from 1948 Convention on the

Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

Article IThe Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or intime of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and punish.

Article IIIn the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intentto destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring

about its physical destruction in whole or in part;(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Article IIIThe following acts shall be punishable:

(a) Genocide;(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;(d) Attempt to commit genocide;(e) Complicity in genocide.

Article IVPersons commiting genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in Article III shall bepunished, whether they are constitutionally responsible, rulers, public officials or privateindividuals.

Article VThe Contracting Parties undertake to enact ... the necessary legislation to give effect to theprovisions of the present Covenant...

Article VIPersons charged with genocide [etc.] shall be tried by a competent tribunal of the State inthe territory of which the act was committed, or by such international penal tribunal asmay have jurisdiction with respect to those Contracting Parties which shall have acceptedits jurisdiction.

Article VIIGenocide [etc.] shall not be considered as political crimes for the purposes of extradition.

The Contracting Parties pledge themselves in such cases to grant extradition in accordancewith their laws and treaties in force.

Article VIIIAny Contracting Party may call upon the competent organs of the United Nations to takesuch action under the Charter of the United Nations as they consider appropriate for theprevention and suppression of acts of genocide or any other acts enumerated in Article III.

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23

Human rights inarmed conflict

6

I f it is possible to generalise about thecauses of armed conflict, they might bedescribed in terms of competing

economic, political, social, or religious/cultural claims and ambitions, or acombination of these. They may or may notbe linked to factors such as a shrinkingresource base relative to population size.Where these claims are not arbitrated byexisting political or legal mechanisms, or byany other means, armed conflict may be theresult. Non-violent solutions demandcompromise, and it is characteristic of armedconflict that the claims and ambitions thatdrive it tend not to be amenable tocompromise. Wars tend to cease either whenthe conflict is settled decisively by militarydefeat or victory; or when they reach anequilibrium or stalemate which allows apolitical settlement (involving compromise)to be reached.

This is no doubt a simplistic sketch of thedynamics of armed conflict. The point is tohighlight some of the features which relate tothe application of international legal standardswhich continue to apply during the course of

the conflict. In the majority of internalconflicts – and the majority of conflicts noware intra- as opposed to inter-state – the partiesto the conflict and the populations from whichthey draw their support will have to go onliving in fairly close proximity within the samenational boundaries when the fighting stops.A process of ‘ethnic cleansing’ may involvethe separation of different elements of thepopulation, but the reluctance of third-partystates to host long-term refugees means thatthis process is increasingly confined withinstate borders.

The competing claims that underlie a conflictmay be left unresolved by the typical steps ina peace process: peace talks, cease fire,demobilisation, territorial agreements, interimpower-sharing arrangements, elections,amnesty, legal reform. At any rate, the conductof hostilities leaves a legacy; and the worsethe atrocities committed by the warringparties, the more bitter that legacy is, the moreunstable the subsequent peace, and the harderit is to unite the various factions in pursuit ofcommon national goals. This is particularlyso if the peace process itself provides for an

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24

amnesty for the perpetrators: impunity is nota firm foundation for longer-termreconciliation, though reconciliation in theshort-term has tended to require compromiseon the demands of justice.

Civilians are no longer incidental victims ofwar. They are often targeted for the politicalsupport they are perceived to provide to oneside or the other. One notorious counter-insurgency strategy of the 1980s was describedas ‘draining the sea from the fish’ – civiliansconstituting the ‘sea’ which hid guerrilla ‘fish’.

Civilians are rarely neutral bystanders in war,and their allegiance is likely to be courted ordemanded by all sides. The term ‘civil war’might seem to imply that the erosion of thedistinction between civilian and military isjustified; that where a society is ‘at war withitself ’, the distinction is meaningless. But thisis a false argument. The vast majority of thepopulation, while it may owe strong ethnic orother allegiance (often through fear of ‘theother’), is not party to the conflict in that itplays no direct part in it. Civilians have playedan indirect part in hostilities throughoutrecorded history, but have not on that accountbeen considered legitimate targets of war.

The way in which war is conducted, and inparticular the treatment of civilians and non-combatants, is the subject of internationalhumanitarian law (IHL). The four GenevaConventions of 1949 and the two AdditionalProtocols of 1977, based on the principle ofnon-combatant immunity, set out in somedetail standards of treatment for those nottaking an active part in hostilities – includingsick and wounded combatants and prisonersof war, as well as civilians. These treatiesconstitute the modern law, but the history ofIHL dates back most famously to 1859 andthe humanitarian initiative of an individual,Henri Dunant, who persuaded Napoleon III –the victor in the battle of Solferino – to allowthe wounded of all nationalities on the battlefield to be given assistance under theprotection of an official proclamation. Bythis, a humanitarian gesture was turned into aprotected right. The subsequent founding ofthe Red Cross movement and the development

of IHL built on this foundation. Today almostall states have ratified the 1949 GenevaConventions; rather fewer have ratified theProtocols. The development of this ‘Geneva’law was paralleled by the development of laws(‘Hague’ law) restricting the types of weaponsthat might legitimately be used, a process thatcontinues today in, for example, agreementsto control the use of anti-personnel mines andother inhumane weapons. Relief workers willnot need to be reminded of the humanitarianimplications of this, and many humanitarianagencies have been involved in advocacyaimed at influencing this process.

The 1949 Conventions and First Protocol applyto international armed conflict only; that isconflict between states. Since most conflictstoday are internal, this limits their application.But the Conventions contain one articlecommon to all four, known as common Article3 [see Box 5 on page 25]. This lays downsome minimum standards for the treatmentof non-combatants during internal armedconflict. It constitutes a basic set of protectionstandards, reflecting general principles ofhumanitarian law, which impose duties on allparties to the conflict, government or other.If relief workers are familiar with only onepart of humanitarian law, it should be this part,since it has universal application.

Whether a particular situation amounts to‘armed conflict’ may be disputed. The SecondProtocol, which is designed to build oncommon Article 3, applies specifically tointernal armed conflicts, but these are definedto include only those conflicts in whichdissident forces exercise effective control overterritory such as to allow them to carry out‘sustained and concerted’ military operations.Internal disturbance and other ‘lower’ levelsof conflict are explicitly excluded, and stateshave notoriously sought to characteriseconflicts in such a way that they fall outsidethe provisions of the Second Protocol. Theprovisions of the Second Protocol are highlysignificant in respect of the protection ofcivilians. They include a prohibition of attackagainst civilian populations as such;prohibition of starvation as a method ofcombat, or destruction of objects like crops,

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25

livestock and water sources which areindispensable to the survival of the ‘civilianpopulation’; and prohibition of forcedrelocation on grounds other than the securityof the civilians concerned or ‘imperativemilitary reasons’. They also allow for theprovision of relief to civilian populations.

The International Committee of the Red Cross(ICRC) has from the outset been the sponsorand guardian of IHL. Its unique status andmandate is reflected in the GenevaConventions themselves; and it is alone amongnon-governmental organisations in having an

explicit mandate in international law. In manyways it enjoys the status and privileges of aninter-governmental organisation. In practice,the preservation of its status depends on strictadherence to principles of neutrality,impartiality and independence. Because statesand others recognise this, the ICRC is oftenable to act as a neutral intermediary betweenfactions, and to perform a protection andassistance role in respect of war victims thatothers may be unable to access.

Neutrality involves not taking sides in adispute; and specifically, not espousing the

BOX 5Article 3, common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949

In the case of armed conflict, not of an international character, occurring in the territory ofone of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as aminimum, the following provisions:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forceswho have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds,detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, withoutany adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion, or faith, sex, birth or wealth,or any other similar criteria.

To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in anyplacewhatsoever with respect to the above mentioned persons:

(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, crueltreatment and torture;

(b) taking of hostages;(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous

judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicialguarantees which are recognised as indispensable by civilised peoples.

(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross,may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means ofspecial agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.

The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of theparties to the conflict.

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26

cause of one side or another in an armedconflict. In theory, consistent application ofhuman rights standards to the actions of allsides to a conflict is not inconsistent withneutrality. In practice, of course, it is likelyto prejudice the ability of a humanitarianagency to deliver relief. For the ICRC, theprinciple of neutrality is rooted in pragmatism.As it is stated in the Fundamental Principlesof the Red Cross Movement: ‘In order to enjoythe confidence of all, the Red Cross may nottake sides in hostilities or engage at any timein controversies of a political, racial, religiousor ideological nature’ (emphasis added).

The practice of operational neutrality makesdemands that few organisations aspire tomeeting. For example, the ICRC willwherever possible work on all sides of aconflict, establishing separate delegations tonegotiate with the warring factions whileinsisting that this implies no formalrecognition of the parties concerned. Thepractice depends on a policy of ‘discretion’;and it is here that the practice of the ICRCdiverges most obviously from that of manyother humanitarian actors. While it can anddoes make representations on human rightsabuses to the controlling authorities, it rarely

makes public condemnations. It is sometimessaid that a commitment to justice demandssuch condemnation. Whether or not that isso, the ICRC believes that its humanitarianmandate precludes such a role. That mandate,however, has protection as a central element.It is the means that ICRC adopts to pursuethat aim that distinguish its work from that ofagencies specialising in public advocacy onhuman rights. There is no fundamental clashof agendas here.

Whether or not other agencies follow thestrictures of operational neutrality, theprinciple of impartiality is one that isfundamental to humanitarianism – and mirrorsthe general human rights principle of non-discrimination. It involves a commitment toproviding relief from suffering on the basisof need alone, giving priority to those ingreater need, without any distinction ongrounds of race, political belief etc.. It isdoubtful whether agencies apply this principleconsistently in practice, but a commitment toit is an essential safeguard to the wholeconcept of humanitarianism. Practical issuessuch as that of restricted access to the peopleaffected should not be allowed to obscure thisbasic principle.

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27

Human rights,refugees and internal

displacement

7

Human rights and displacement

The commonest context for relief activitiesis that of human displacement, usually withcommunities fleeing the effects of armedconflict. In this section we shall look at thehuman rights aspects of displacement and askhow these relate to traditional humanitarianconcerns. First, some definitions.

‘Displaced’

People are said to be ‘displaced’ when theyhave been in some sense forced to leave theirhome. This will not include all migrants butshould probably include ‘distress’ migrantsfleeing the effects of natural disaster.2 Theyare internally displaced if they remain withinthe borders of their own country.

‘Refugees’

A ‘refugee’ is someone who is externallydisplaced, that is someone who has fled acrossa national boundary. But the formal definitionof a refugee is more specific than that, anddefines the reasons for displacement: the most

common definition, in the 1951 Conventionon the Status of Refugees, refers to someonewho is externally displaced through a ‘well-founded fear of persecution’. Otherdefinitions (e.g. found in the OAU AfricanConvention) broaden the definition to embracethose fleeing ‘events seriously disturbingpublic order’, for example armed conflict.What the legal definitions have in common isthe further condition that the person concernedmust be unable to secure protection from thethreat in question in the country of origin. Itis this non-availability of effective nationalprotection, and the need for internationalprotection, which is the main characteristicof a refugee. No such definition exists forthose displaced internally, who are presumedto enjoy national protection.

The relevant rights are found in refugee lawand in general human rights law. The corehuman right here is freedom of movement.As defined in international law [Rights &Freedoms in the Covenant on Civil andPolitical Rights 1966 (Article12), see Box 2on page 20] this comprises three elements:

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28

(i) freedom of movement within a countryin which one is lawfully resident

(ii) freedom to leave any country(iii) the right to return to one’s own country

The first two apply to nationals and non-nationals alike; the third only to nationals ofthe country in question. They are subject tolegal restrictions, but these must not bearbitrary or discriminatory. In particular, theyare subject to suspension during a state ofemergency under the derogation powersdescribed earlier. In the absence of suchexceptional measures, which are valid only ifthey meet strict conditions, the rightsdescribed above may be assumed to apply.

What is the significance of these rights in thecontext of displacement? First, they outlawforced displacement of people other than onexceptional grounds (humanitarian lawimposes similar restrictions) but give peoplefreedom to move to safer areas if threatened.Second, they allow people to leave a countryto seek safety beyond its borders – thoughthere is not a corresponding right to enter anycountry, even in search of asylum (see below).Third, the right to return implies a right forrefugees to repatriate when they wish to.

Internally displaced people

There is no specific provision or mechanismfor the protection of internally displacedpeople (IDPs). In theory, they are protectedunder general human rights provisions,including those mentioned above, to the extentthey have not been legitimately derogatedfrom; and where relevant, by the provisionsof international humanitarian law. In theory,too, they continue to enjoy the protection ofthose rights by their own government. Inpractice, of course, they may get no suchprotection. Yet the extension of internationalprotection to people within their own borders,even given the willingness to provide it, runsup against sovereignty and is fraught withdifficulty. Such populations, perceived aspartisan, are often treated by belligerents aslegitimate targets of war. The experiment with‘safe areas’ in The Former Yugoslavia hadmixed results, to say the least: in practice they

were anything but safe, the UN interventionforce evidently lacking the necessaryprotection mandate or the political resolve tofulfil such a mandate.

The role of the ICRC in bringing relief to suchpopulations, and in attempting to secure theirprotection, is an important and well-established one. UNHCR has in several recentcases extended its assistance (if not itsprotection) activities to cover internallydisplaced populations. But IDPs may suffergreater problems than refugees with few ofthe equivalent protections. The issue of IDPprotection has been the subject of much debatein recent years, and the appointment by theUN Secretary General of a Representative (MrFrancis Deng) to examine and report on thesituation of IDPs – estimated to be some 25million people worldwide – has highlightedthe issue without so far resulting in any newagreement on institutional mandates. It isdebated whether existing legal provisions aresufficient, and responsibilities adequatelydefined; but in any case, the political andpractical obstacles to the consistentapplication of the relevant standards areformidable. Establishing respect for thehumanitarian law principle of non-combatantimmunity (see next section) is perhaps the keyissue here.

Refugees, refugee law and UNHCR

There is no universal ‘right of asylum’ – thatis, there is no legal obligation on states to grantprotection to refugees, despite the wording ofthe Universal Declaration on Human Rights(UDHR). States have in practice tended toaccept at least a moral obligation to giveasylum to those who meet the definition of‘refugee’ in the 1951 Refugee Convention.However, what constitutes asylum is notdefined in that or any other text, though at aminimum it must include at least temporaryprotection against the threat from which therefugee fled. However, the 1951 Conventioncontains a vital safeguard in the principle ofnon-refoulement, ie. having crossed a nationalboundary, a refugee shall not be expelled orreturned to the frontiers of territories ‘wherehis life or freedom would be threatened on

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29

account of his race, religion, nationality,membership of a particular social group orpolitical opinion’ (art.33). Since theassessment of refugee status involvesdetermining the existence of just such threats,it follows that an asylum seeker cannot beexpelled before such determination has beenmade.

Once admitted as a refugee, whether as a resultof individual status determination or on thebasis of ‘group’ determination, the 1951Convention and regional agreements in Africaand Latin America lay down certain rightsrelating to status and entitlements, basedbroadly on the principle that refugees shouldbe treated as far as possible in the same wayas citizens of the host state.

An increasing trend in recent years whendealing with mass exodus of refugees, forexample with the Vietnamese refugees andthose from The Former Yugoslavia, has beenthe granting of ‘temporary protected status’on the basis of group determination rather thanfull refugee status. This lesser form ofprotection is now explicitly premised on theidea that refugees will be sent home as soonas it possible to do so, subject to the ‘non-refoulement’ requirement. While the use ofthis device has been welcomed by UNHCR asallowing speed and flexibility of response, itcarries with it dangers and limitations inrespect of refugee protection. It also rules outany longer-term solution other thanrepatriation. It has the advantage ofreconciling the divergent interests of a statefaced with mass immigration and of refugeesrequiring protection in the short-term. Whatit fails to do is to make any distinction as tothe longer-term protection needs of a diversegroup of individuals.

The practice of temporary protection at leasthas the merit of recognising the immediateprotection needs of asylum seekers, and thehumanitarian imperative of assisting them.There is another trend that is of more concern.The concern with the ‘right to remain’, andthe focus on root causes of refugee movement,is laudable in itself – it would be hard todisagree with the importance of addressing the

human rights issues that underlie refugeemovement, and ensuring that effectivenational protection is available. But it isaccompanied by an increasing tendency tostop asylum-seekers ever getting near theborders of potential countries of asylum. Themeasures that industrialised states haveincreasingly adopted to restrict the flow ofasylum seekers constitute an attempt to ‘bottleup’ the problem in the South. Those states inthe South that, willingly or not, do bear theburden of large refugee flows receive littleassistance in carrying out what the law andinternational opinion requires of them. It isnot surprising that their patience is in manycases wearing thin. Certainly it would beunjust to make them the sole target of criticismfor the apparent erosion of internationalprotection.

Two other elements of the 1951 Conventionon which greater stress has recently beenplaced are the exception and cessation clauses.These relate to the questions of whatdisqualifies a person from claiming refugeestatus; and when does a refugee cease to be arefugee.

Roughly, a person is disqualified if they areguilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity,or serious non-political crimes. In addition,someone who may reasonably be consideredto constitute a threat to national security inthe host country, or who has been convictedof a particularly serious crime and constitutesa danger to the community, cannot claim theprotection of the non-refoulement provision.

Under the ‘ceased circumstances’ clause of the1951 Convention, a person ceases to be arefugee when s/he ‘can no longer, because thecircumstances in connection with which he hasbeen recognised as a refugee have ceased toexist, continue to refuse to avail himself ofthe protection of the country of hisnationality’. This clause is increasingly beinglooked to by host and donor states; and ithighlights the question of protectionguarantees in the country of origin.

Relief NGOs tend to be more familiar withthe role of UNHCR in coordinating relief

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30

assistance to refugees than they are with theagency’s primary role and mandate: that ofrefugee protection. Under its Statute, theagency’s mandate contains two mainelements: providing international protectionon the one hand, and seeking permanentsolutions to the ‘problem of refugees’ on theother. Its role in coordinating welfareassistance efforts is very much subsidiary inthe Statute, yet has developed to the pointwhere it often seems to obscure itsfundamental (and unique) protection function.That function is increasingly under threat.Since the assistance role is largely carried outthrough ‘contractor’ NGOs, with UNHCRacting as a conduit for donor funds, it is anissue in which NGOs are inextricably caughtup. In the rest of this section we shall beconcerned with the two primary mandatedfunctions, and the apparent shift in UNHCR’sinterpretation of its own mandate.

We have said that it is the search for protectionnot available in the country of origin whichcharacterises a refugee. UNHCR’s role insecuring international protection has much todo with securing recognition of refugee statusand the rights that follow from that (legal)status under the 1951 Refugee Convention. Sowhile ‘protection’ includes the more obviousmeaning of protection from attack orpersecution, it has a broader meaning; and itextends to the protection of refugees’ vitalinterests, those interests that human rights aredesigned to protect. A refugee or any othernon-national has the same human rights claimson the host state as a national (and equivalentduties).3

The protection role of UNHCR relates mostcrucially to the principle of non-refoulement.It is here that the protection of refugees isperhaps under greatest threat. The apparentacquiescence in involuntary repatriation ofRwandan and Burundian refugees – whetheror not this amounted to refoulement – marksa retreat (under duress) from an importantworking principle. But protection in thecountry of asylum has itself been neglected.Recent events in eastern Zaire and Tanzaniahave illustrated how the focus on reliefassistance to the exclusion of protection – in

this case, against the threat posed to refugeeswithin camps by those military and politicalelements that orchestrated the genocide inRwanda – represents a seriously inadequateresponse. It has even been suggested that,given its apparent inability in that situation tofulfil its mandate of providing internationalprotection, UNHCR ought to have withdrawn,leaving others to fulfil their primary functionof providing relief assistance.4 UNHCR itselfrecognises this problem and is taking steps tostrengthen its protection capacity inhumanitarian emergencies. Whether thepolitical actors with correspondingresponsibility for protection are committed tofulfiling that responsibility remains doubtful.

Where the imperatives of providing reliefassistance obscure the protection issues – andthis is by no means an issue for UNHCR alone– then any humanitarian agency with acommitment to human rights is bound to lookbeyond the immediate task of providing relief.Though the humanitarian imperative maydictate a particular agency’s course of action,it should never be party to a denial of theprotection issues – the solution to which willgenerally lie with political actors. Whererelief is delivered in the context of on-goingarmed conflict, there will be a close linkbetween protection issues and the factorsperpetuating the conflict. The relationshipbetween protection and assistance is exploredfurther in the next section.

This relates to the second core element ofUNHCR’s mandate: the search for solutions.It is striking that the Executive Committee‘statements’ have tended to reposition it as ageneral humanitarian actor. So too have itsmore public pronouncements. This, forexample, from UNHCR’s State of the World’sRefugees 1995 (p.43):

“UNHCR has been obliged to develop newareas of competence and to undertake anumber of non-traditional activities. Theseinclude, for example, providing protection andassistance to besieged and war-affectedpopulations; monitoring the protection needsof returnees and internally displaced peoplein their own country; establishing community

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based rehabilitation programmes in returneeareas; and providing accurate information onmigration opportunities to prospective asylumseekers. As a result... UNHCR has beentransformed from a refugee organisation intoa more broadly-based humanitarian agency.”

This shift is described as a ‘new paradigm’:away from a refugee-centric approach whichwas ‘reactive and exile-oriented’, towards amore holistic approach which is ‘proactive andhomeland-oriented’. This has beenaccompanied by a new focus on the right toremain as well as the right to return, and onthe responsibilities of countries of origin withregard to refugee flows from their borders.The prevention of refugee flows in the firstplace is at the centre of this approach, whichclearly has the potential for conflict with theright to leave a country and to seek asylum.

It is apparent from this that, in the agency’sown view, its mandate has developed toembrace root causes as well as solutions,internally displaced as well as refugees,development as well as relief. While theseare all important areas of concern, the loss offocus on the core activity of protection thatseems to have accompanied thisdiversification is very worrying. UNHCR, inembracing an agenda that mirrors donors’concern with keeping people within their owncountries, is in danger of losing sight of itsraison d’etre. The institution of asylum canonly be weakened as a result.

A final word on the search for permanent ordurable solutions. We might ask “solutionsto whose problem?” There is not one ‘refugeeproblem’ in a given context, but a number ofinterlocking problems: the refugees’ ownproblems, the host government’s problem, thecountry of origin’s problem, the donors’problem, and so on. The type of solution that

is pursued may depend on the weighting givento these various concerns, but there are certainminimum protection requirements that anysolution must fulfil. For while repatriation atthe earliest possible opportunity may be theanswer to everybody’s problem, equally it maynot. It has to be recognised that there arepotentially conflicting interests here, and thata coincidence of interests among state partiesmay yet run counter to the interests of therefugees themselves. The principle of non-refoulement and the practice of voluntaryrepatriation set a bottom line of protection,and must be defended. Equally, a moreimaginative and far-sighted approach to theproblem of refugees could lead to the pursuitof more genuinely durable solutions.Premature repatriation, on the other hand,holds the potential for creating furtherinstability and displacement in its wake.

UNHCR’s own statute requires that its workbe of ‘an entirely non-political character’; yetclearly the contexts in which it is operatingare highly politically charged, and themotivation of the state actors concerned isessentially political rather than humanitarian.By losing sight of the primacy of its functionof protecting refugees, UNHCR runs the riskthat the interests of refugees are simply notweighed in the balance of competing interests;that fundamental protection principles areeroded; and that alternative solutions are notexplored. It is its function to ensure that theyare. One may sympathise with the dilemmaswhich UNHCR staff face in seeking to do theirjob and keep their various constituencieshappy – pressure from donors and host stateshas recently become intense – but the bestresponse is surely one that keeps UNHCR toits (limited) mandate and supports it in itsefforts to fulfil that mandate. Concentratingexclusively on the delivery of relief is not theway to achieve this.

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Protection andassistance

8

Earlier sections have sought to sketch outthe key aspects of the legal frameworkwhich applies to conflict-affected,

displaced and other populations inhumanitarian crisis; and to describe howdifferent agencies’ mandates apply to theenforcement of the legal and moral principlesinvolved. In recent years there has been agrowing awareness of the need to reconcilethe apparently disparate demands of humanrights monitoring and advocacy on the onehand, and operational relief programmes onthe other. This section explores therelationship between protection and assistanceactivities, and the degree to which theycomplement or conflict with each other.

What constitutes a humanitarian crisis?Opinions will vary, but as a working definitionlet us say that a humanitarian crisis is anysituation involving an exceptional andwidespread threat to life, health or subsistencethat exceeds the coping capacity of individualsand the community. This suggests a numberof possible forms of intervention:

(i) action to prevent, remove or mitigate thefactors which caused the crisis (e.g.

flooding, armed conflict);(ii) relief action to reduce the immediate

threat by providing for those needs thatthe affected communities cannot meetby themselves;

(iii) action to enhance coping capacities, tohasten people’s recovery and return toself-sufficiency.

These, of course, are not mutually exclusivecategories. The point is to suggest ways inwhich protection and assistance activities areconnected, and how both relate to human rightsclaims. Earlier, we took protection activitiesto be those aimed at ensuring that theappropriate authorities fulfil theirresponsibilities in preventing denial or abuseof people’s human rights. This is partly amatter of securing recognition of protectedstatus. There is clearly a large degree ofoverlap with assistance activities, for examplein advocacy aimed at lifting a siege on abeleaguered civilian population.

We saw earlier that in the context of conflict,IHL has gone a long way to defininghumanitarian rights, which supplement thecore human rights. These are concerned for

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33

the most part with category (i) above, in thatthey are designed to shield non-combatantsfrom the worst effects of conflict. They arein that sense mostly ‘protection’ rights. Reliefassistance is also protected in IHL, if notactually established as an absolute right. Butthe rights regime taken as whole, as we haveseen, is designed more to protect againstthreats to security (physical, economic, social,political) than to meet people’s immediateneeds where they cannot do so themselves.

Most people, left in peace and freedom, willcope within the support structures of familyand community – though chronic poverty mayleave them perpetually vulnerable to disaster.But in a situation where people’s freedom ofaction, and range of options, is severelycurtailed, that assumption can no longer bemade. It is here, perhaps, that the connectionbetween protection and assistance needs isclosest. The need to remove the factorsconstraining people’s freedom of action maybe the paramount humanitarian concern in anygiven situation. The removal of those factorsis a protection issue, since they constitute athreat to human rights.

It is important to locate responsibility forprotection where it belongs. Neither UNHCRnor ICRC can physically protect people, norprovide other forms of protection; their taskis to ensure that those responsible and able toprovide protection do so. During armedconflict, it is likely that beyond people’s ownefforts to help and shield each other, only thewarring parties themselves can provideeffective protection. This, we have seen,involves recognising civilian status and theimmunities that are attached to it. Theprovisions of humanitarian law set out in somedetail the duties of the combatants in thisrespect; and all have at least a moralcommitment to the observance of humanrights.

Effective protection against imminent threatsis almost certain to be found locally, if at all.Protection activities are therefore best aimedat the most local level in the first instance;and that might involve talking to a prisonguard, or local commander. Again, this

depends on an awareness of responsibilities.Much of ICRC’s work is concerned with the‘dissemination’ of IHL. Similar work inrespect of human rights is carried out by avariety of agencies. Human rights training,advice centres to inform people of their rights,and so on, are all dissemination activities. Butthe validity of the currency depends on itsbeing used and recognised by all concerned.This includes all relief agencies.

The provision of relief may itself haveprotection implications, positive or negative.To take a recent (negative) example fromLiberia: valuable dry food rations weredistributed to feed malnourished populations.As people left the distribution points, theywere attacked for the food that they werecarrying. In other instances, people have beendeliberately manoeuvred by armed factions inorder to attract aid supplies. And thewillingness of aid agencies to supply relief toforcibly relocated populations has arguablyallowed that practice to occur where it mightnot otherwise have happened.

The positive potential of relief assistance forthe protection of the recipients is debatable.In some cases, the presence of internationalagencies may have acted as a disincentive toattacks – and the open relief centres’ in SriLanka are an example of where protection andassistance have been mutually reinforcing.But it is doubtful whether generalisations maybe drawn from this, and there are many counterexamples. Kibeho in Rwanda comes to mindas a recent disastrous example (see Cohen,1996). There, an international force with aspecific protection mandate (UNAMIR) wasitself apparently impotent to stop a massacreof those it was there to protect.

Finally, protection activities – which tend toinvolve exposing actual or potential humanrights abuse – do not always endear the agencyconcerned to the authorities. A relief agencythat takes a public stand in an attempt to getthe responsible authority or others to act,obviously risks losing the consent that itdepends on for continued access. Its decisionwill presumably be based on an interpretationof its own objectives, and an assessment of

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how it can best benefit the populationconcerned. In practice, it tends also to be basedon an assessment of whether it is actually ableto be effective as a relief agency in thecircumstances; and what impact could beachieved by withdrawal and denunciation. Thevery factors which constitute a threat to humanrights may limit the agency’s capacity to acteffectively.

For most relief agencies this question ofeffectiveness is likely to be the decidingquestion. If people have a right to assistance,

then fulfilment of that right may require adecision to stay. Agencies specialising inhuman rights advocacy may be left to exposethe abuse in question, perhaps supplied withinformation by the relief agency. But if theprovision of relief is itself contributing to theongoing threat to people? People have a rightto, and need for, protection. Agencies arerightly taking this issue increasingly seriously.An assessment of relative benefit and risk ishard to make, but that difficulty has too oftenled agencies to duck the issue.

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Conclusion andrecommendations

9

The need for relief workers to increasetheir knowledge and understanding ofhuman rights standards arises from at

least two factors: (i) the need to beaccountable, and hold others accountable, toexisting standards which recognisehumanitarian rights; and (ii) thecorresponding possibilities for more focusedand effective advocacy at all levels onhumanitarian issues. It is legitimate to seethe provision of humanitarian relief as part ofa spectrum of human rights activity. Butassistance activities have too often beenconducted without an analysis of theprotection issues which often make suchassistance necessary in the first place.

Protection activities relate to the wholespectrum of rights which guarantee physical,economic, social and political security.Assistance activities are concerned with thefulfilment of physical and economic needs atone end of this spectrum; but as was arguedin an earlier section, the fulfilment of thesesubsistence rights may be dependent on therecognition of social, legal and political statusand the rights that go with it – as a civilian, as

a refugee, as a woman, as a worker, as a child,and so on. The two cannot be divorced.Relief agencies should be held accountable forthe protection implications of their work, justas they are increasingly being asked todemonstrate the beneficial impact of the reliefassistance provided. But that accountabilityshould probably be limited to the obligationto eliminate or mitigate the potential negativeprotection consequences of their interventions.They are at present answerable to no-one inthis respect.

The following recommendations for actionfollow from the argument of this paper:

1. An assessment of needs should alwaysinclude an assessment of protectionneeds –including issues of civil and legalstatus as well as physical and economicsecurity. How are people’s rightsthreatened, who is the responsibleauthority, and what steps can be takento ensure that protection is given?

2. Following on from this, it is suggestedthat given the potential negative

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implications for people’s protection ofproviding relief assistance, agenciesshould work to the following principle:an assessment should always be madeof the protection implications ofproviding relief in a particular form ina given context; and steps taken tominimise the potential negative side-effects for the target population posedby such intervention. This may,ultimately, involve a decision not tointervene.

3. The ability to make a generalassessment of protection needs assumesa basic grounding in the relevant legalstandards (international and national) aswell asfamiliarity with the relevantstructures and responsibilities. The needfor appropriate training follows fromthis. Training should involve materialswhich relate to situations that reliefworkers will actually face in the field.

4. People need information about their ownrights. New ways need to be exploredby which people can be helped to pursueadvocacy on their own and others’behalf. Leaflets, advice centres, formaltraining, etc. may all be part of this.

5. As well as understanding the basicprinciples of human rights, and the legalstandards which reinforce them, reliefworkers should understand the specificrole and formal mandate of agencies likeUNHCR and the ICRC. Though notalways described in these terms, theirmandates are intrinsically concernedwith the protection of human rights.This may imply the need to relate ratherdifferently to these agencies, and in

particular to recognise the significanceof their protection role and of theirnegotiating status. It is suggested thatinsufficient recognition is given to – anduse made of – these existing channelsby those relief agencies concernedwith human rights advocacy. Theirmandates are weakened as a result.

6. Complementing the relevant legalprovisions are a number of codes ofconduct, declarations, workingprinciples and similar, which seek toregulate the way in which relief isdelivered, the conditions attached to theprovision of relief, minimum technicalstandards, and minimum humanitarianstandards that ought to be universallyapplied. Some of these are already quitewell established, others are currentlybeing evolved. They deserve to be morewidely known and applied byhumanitarian agencies. The followingshould be mentioned:

(i) The Red Cross / NGO Code of Conduct(ii) The Turku Declaration on Minimum

Standards (1991)(iii) (under development) minimum

technical and general standards forrelief provision, under the auspices ofthe Steering Committee forHumanitarian Response andInterAction.

(iv) Various context-specific initiatives, ofwhich those in South Sudan and in Lib-eria have been mentioned above, whichseek to apply some form of human rightsconditionality to the provision of reliefassistance – or to incorporate minimumprotection standards – in negotiationwith the controlling authorities.

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Endnotes

1 pg 9 Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd Edition

2 pg 27 The distinction is often hard to draw, and is frequently a matter of contention in determining refugee status.

3 pg 30 The only exception relates to economic rights, where ‘developing states’ are given discretion under the Economic Covenant as to the extent to which these are guaranteed to non-nationals.

4 pg 30 Goodwin-Gill in paper entitled ‘Refugee Identity and the Fading Prospect of International Protection’- see bibliography

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Beetham, D. ‘What Future for Economic and Social Rights ?’ in Politics and Human Rights(Political Studies Association, 1995)

Brownlie, I. Basic Documents on Human Rights (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1992)

Cohen, R. ‘Protecting the Internally Displaced’ in World Refugee Survey 1996 (US Committeefor Refugees)

Deng, F. M. ‘Internally Displaced Persons: An Interim Report to the United Nations Secretary-General on Protection and Assistance’ – UNDHA and Refugee Policy Group (December 1994)

Eriksson, J. et al. The International Response to Conflict and Genocide: Lessons from theRwanda Experience (Synthesis Report from Joint Evaluation of Emergency Assistance toRwanda, March 1996)

Fischer, H. ed., Law in Humanitarian Crises (2 vols. European Commission, 1995)

Gewith, A. Human Rights (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1982)

Goodwin-Gill, G. The Refugee in International Law 2nd ed. (Oxford, OUP, 1996)

Goodwin-Gill, G. ‘Refugee Identity and the Fading Prospect of International Protection’ paperfor conference on Refugee Rights and Realities at the Human Rights Law Centre, University ofNottingham, 30 November 1996

Green, L.C. The Contemporary Law of Armed Conflict (Manchester, Manchester UniversityPress, 1993)

Harroff-Tavel, M. ‘Action Taken by the ICRC in Situations of Internal Violence’ offprint fromInternational Review of the Red Cross (Geneva, May/June 1993)

Harroff-Tavel, M. ‘Neutrality and impartiality : the importance of these principles for theInternational Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and the difficulties involved in applyingthem’offprint from International Review of the Red Cross (Geneva, November/December 1989)

Hathaway, J. ‘Can International Refugee Law Be Made Relevant Again ?’ in World RefugeeSurvey 1996 (US Committee for Refugees)

Selected bibliography

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Macrae, J. ‘The origins of unease: setting the context of the current ethical debate’ – back-ground paper for the ECHO Forum on Ethics in Humanitarian Aid, Dublin (December 1996)

Meron, T. ed., Human Rights in International Law (Oxford, OUP, 1984)

Sieghart, P. The Lawful Rights of Mankind (Oxford, OUP, 1986)

Shue, H. Basic Rights (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1980)

Slim, H. ‘Doing the right thing: relief agencies, moral dilemmas and moral responsibility inpolitical emergencies and war’ October 1996 – background paper for Scandanavian NGOWorkshop on Humanitarian Ethics, Nordic African Institute, Uppsala October 1996

The 1949 Geneva Conventions and 1977 Additional Protocols (ICRC)

UNHCR, The State of the World’s Refugees, 1995 (Oxford, OUP for UNHCR, 1995)

RRNBackground

The Relief and Rehabilitation Network was conceived in 1992 and launched in 1994 as amechanism for professional information exchange in the expanding field of humanitarianaid. The need for such a mechanism was identified in the course of research undertakenby the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) on the changing role of NGOs in relief andrehabilitation operations, and was developed in consultation with other Networks operatedwithin ODI. Since April 1994, the RRN has produced publications in three differentformats, in French and English: Good Practice Reviews, Network Papers and Newsletters.The RRN is now in its second three-year phase (1996-1999), supported by four new donors- DANIDA, ECHO, the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and ODA. Over the three yearphase, the RRN will seek to expand its reach and relevance amongst humanitarian agencypersonnel and to further promote good practice.

Objective

To improve aid policy and practice as it is applied in complex political emergencies.

Purpose

To contribute to individual and institutional learning by encouraging the exchange anddissemination of information relevant to the professional development of those engagedin the provision of humanitarian assistance.

Activities

To commission, publish and disseminate analysis and reflection on issues of good practicein policy and programming in humanitarian operations, primarily in the form of writtenpublications, in both French and English.

Target audience

Individuals and organisations actively engaged in the provision of humanitarian assistanceat national and international, field-based and head office level in the ‘North’ and ‘South’.

The Relief and Rehabilitation Network is supported by:

Ministry of Foreign AffairsDANIDA ECHO

Irish Department of Foreign Affairs ODA