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South Asia Declaration calls on governments to strengthen refugee protection

January 24, 2004

ISLAMABAD, 24 Jan (UNHCR) - A group of eminent individuals from South Asia issued a declaration on Saturday calling for their governments to adopt a uniform and comprehensive legal framework to guarantee the protection of refugees in the region.

The South Asia Declaration on Refugees was issued after two days of discussion by members of the Eminent Persons Group (EPG), an organisation of leading figures from five South Asian countries that was formed at the suggestion of the UN Refugee Agency 10 years ago.

"This declaration is a momentous step in the history of treatment of refugees in South Asia," Sri Wijeratne, chairman of the Sri Lankan EPG, told a concluding news conference after talks involving UNHCR representatives from headquarters and the region.

None of the countries of South Asia has signed the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees - the basic international agreement on the protection of refugees - but the EPG had proposed a model international law that is now incorporated in the new South Asia Declaration.

"The absence of a national legal framework for dealing with refugees in countries in the region gives rise to disparities in the treatment of refugees as well as to uncertainties in approaches to refugee problems, and risks arbitrariness in dealing with refugees," said the preamble to the Declaration.

While the Declaration asks governments of the participating countries - Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal - to sign the 1951 Convention, it also wants them to enact national law based on the model contained in the new document.

The Declaration touches on all aspects of refugee protection, such as the commitment to granting asylum, fair treatment for refugees in the country of asylum and protection against refugees being forcibly returned to a country where they would be in danger.

It also encourages the finding of durable solutions for refugees - repatriation to their countries, local integration in the host country or resettlement in a third country when other alternatives are not available.

"This is something which is very important and will become a benchmark for the countries to follow," Nasim Hassan Shah, retired justice of the Supreme Court and chairman of the Pakistan EPG, said of the Declaration. "This is another great achievement of this forum."

The regional consultations on refugees in South Asia were initiated by the previous UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata, in 1994 to provide a forum for eminent persons from the five South Asian countries to find ways to improve protection for refugees.

Shah said national EPG organisations would now approach ministers in their countries to persuade them to bring forward legislation in conformity with the Declaration. The Pakistan EPG has already been discussing changes to their country's laws relating to refugees with the government and legislators.

The countries of South Asia face a variety of refugee problems. Nepal is hosting refugees from Bhutan and Myanmar refugees are in Bangladesh. Pakistan has hosted millions of Afghan refugees over the past 25 years, while India has a variety of refugee populations.

Sri Lanka is hosting only 18 refugees, but some 800,000 of its citizens are internally displaced by years of civil conflict and another million Sri Lankans left their country because of war.

"Now we have this Declaration, which is an advance of the model law, which we will commend to the governments, to adopt in their national legislations and that will be a great step forward for refugee protection," said the chairman of the Pakistan EPG