Focussing on internal displacement

The plight of the world’s internally displaced persons (IDPs) was discussed by a high-level panel at the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) on Wednesday. The panel discussion, moderated by UN Emergency Relief Coordinator a.i. Carolyn McAskie, and chaired by ECOSOC Vice-President Vladimir Sotirov, was the first formal event of ECOSOC’s humanitarian segment. The panel included senior UN and International Committee of the Red Cross officials. Much discussion focused on the notion that it is the primary duty and legal responsibility of sovereign states to protect and assist the displaced but that many governments lack the capacity to do this in times of conflict and need help from the international community. “The best way to safeguard sovereignty is to welcome international involvement,” the Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Displaced Persons, Francis Deng, told delegates. In such cases humanitarian agencies have had to assume responsibility for assisting and protecting IDPs, but aid agencies accept that the response has been mixed. “The past few years are strewn with cases where huge numbers of IDPs have greatly suffered because of the lack of protection and assistance...” the Steering Committee for Humanitarian Response (SCHR) said in a briefing note. These countries include Angola, DRC, Burundi, Rwanda, Kosovo, and Sierra Leone, the coalition of non-governmental and religious organisations added. Recognising that the response of the international community to internal displacement was “selective, uneven and inadequate”, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata told delegates that the nature of her agency’s involvement with IDPs varied between operations and regions, in light of political and financial support, as well as operational and security constraints. In Africa, UNHCR’s involvement with IDPs is limited and has usually been in the context of refugee repatriation operations, according to a briefing paper provided by the refugee agency. UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy said insufficient attention was paid to the specific needs of the world’s 13 million displaced children, who make up 50 percent of all IDPs. “The most critical issue facing IDP children is the lack of a full appreciation that they even exist, the lack of understanding of their special needs for assistance and protection,” Bellamy said. “...it is difficult to over-emphasise the traumatic impact that displacement has on children and their families. “The strain of displacement can lead to the break-up of the family, leaving children physically, socially and emotionally vulnerable. Indeed, the psychosocial impact of displacement can have severe effects on their development and can also affect them long after their displacement has ended.” ICRC Director-General Paul Grossrieder said that internal displacement must be seen as a reflection of a wider crisis affecting the entire civilian population. Issues relating to internal displacement, he said, should not be considered in isolation. “Whereas the internally displaced often arrive empty-handed and in need of immediate support to survive, persons left behind may suffer extreme hardship and danger,” Grossrieder said. “Host communities in turn have shared their limited resources with the displaced, leaving both those communities and the displaced in destitution.” Presentations were also made at the session by three country-based UN humanitarian coordinators: Zoraida Mesa, Martin Mogwanja and Marco Borsotti, who are responsible for Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Georgia respectively. Other contributors included many of the delegates from member states who attended the panel discussion. [ECOSOC serves as the central forum for discussing international economic and social issues, and for formulating policy recommendations addressed to member states and to the United Nations system.]