Special rapporteurs as law makers: the developments and evolution of the normative framework for protecting and assisting internally displaced persons

Abstract

This article examines the development and evolution of the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and other relevant supplementary soft-laws prepared within the mandate of the special rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons. By showcasing the increasing recognition and acceptance of the guiding principles as an authoritative framework governing the issue of internal displacement at the national, regional and international levels, the paper seeks to illustrate how the guiding principles exemplified the role of special procedures of the Human Rights Council in the development of international human rights law with respect to emerging and challenging human rights issues. Recent attempts by other special procedures of the Human Rights Council to develop relevant soft-laws within their mandate have partly been inspired by the success of these principles. The article specifically identifies how the mandate-holder has developed a successful and unique relationship with the United Nations and regional organisations to further augment the relevance and influence of the guiding principles. It discusses the ground-breaking codification of regional treaties on internal displacement in Africa as evidence of this unique collaboration and cooperation.

Keywords:

• African Union Convention on the protection of and assistance to internally displaced persons
• Human Rights Council
• internal displacement
• the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement
• the special rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons
• special procedures

Notes

The United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, Report of the representative of the secretary-general, Mr Franci Deng, submitted pursuant to Commission on Human Rights' Resolution 1997/39, Addendum, E/CN.4/1998/53/ADD.2, 1998.

Jeroen Gutter, ‘Special Procedures and the Human Rights Council: Achievements and Challenges Ahead’, Human Rights Law Review 7 (2007): 1.

Ibid.

Kofi Annan, ‘Preface’, in Masses in Flight: The Global Crisis of Internal Displacement, ed. Roberta Cohen and Francis Deng (Washington, DC: Brooking Institutions, 1998), xix.

The current institutional building text has introduced a procedure for the appointment of special procedures, such as the public listing and the role of the consultative group in which only states participate.

CHR Res. 1992/73.

A/HRC/14 /L.18.

A/HRC/6/32.

CHR Res. 1992/73.

CHR Res. 1992/73.

UN Doc. E/CN.4/1992/23 (1992), para. 91.

E/CN.4/1993/35, 65.

Simon Bagshaw, Developing a Normative Framework for the Protection of Internally Displaced Persons (Ardsley, NY: Transnational Publishers, 2005), 80.

Francis Den, Compilation and Analysis of Legal Norms (New York and Geneva: UN, 1998), E/CN.4/1996/52/Add.2, 65.

Compilation and Analysis of Legal Norms, Part II: Legal Aspects Relating to the Human Rights to be Protected against Arbitrary Displacement, Report of the Representative of the Secretary General on Internally Displaced Persons to the UN Commission on Human Rights, UN Doc. E/CN.4/1998/Add.1, 1998.

Kalin Walter, ‘How Hard is Soft Law? The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and the Need for a Normative Framework’, in Recent Commentaries about the Nature and Application of the Guiding Principles in Internal Displacement (Ardsley, NY: The Brooking CUNY Project on Internal Displacement, 2002), 4–7.

Ibid.

Ibid.

Roberta Cohen, ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement: An Innovation in International Standard Setting’, Global Governance 10 (2004): 460.

E/CN.4/2002/95, para. 15.

Weiss and Korn state this model ‘shows how individuals and groups working outside of the diplomatic circuit can affect the norms that to a considerable extent shape international action’, in Thomas Weiss and David Korn, Internal Displacement: Conceptualisation and its Consequences (New York: Routledge, 2006), 3; Simon Bagshaw, Developing the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement: The Role of a Global Public Policy Network (Florence, Italy: European University Institute: GPP, 1999).

Bagshaw, Developing a Normative Framework, 75.

Mihael Nyinah, ‘What May be Borrowed: What is News? Debate’, Forced Migration Review 4 (1999): 39.

Ibid.

Walter Kalin, ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement as International Minimum Standard and Protection Tool’, Refugee Survey Quarterly 24 (2005): 28.

Roberta Cohen, ‘The Development of International Standards to Protect Internally Displaced Persons’, in Human Rights and Forced Displacement, ed. Anne F. Bayefsky and Joan Fitzpatrick (The Hague, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2000), 79.

Kalin, ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement as International Minimum Standard and Protection Tool’, 27–36.

Introduction, para. 3, Report of the Representative of the Secretary General, Mr Francis M. Deng, Addendum: Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, UN Doc. E/CN.4/1998/53/Add.2, 1998.

Cohen, ‘The Development of International Standards to Protect Internally Displaced Persons’, 76.

Kalin Walter, Annotations (Washington, DC: Brooking Institutions, 2008), 5.

Joan Fitzpatrick, ‘Human Rights and Forced Displacement: Converging Standards’, in Human Rights and Forced Displacement, ed. Anne F. Bayefsky and Joan Fitzpatrick (The Hague, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2000), 10.

See Principle 4.

See Principle 11, para. 2; Principle 19.

See Principle 18.

See Principle 23.

See Principle 19, para. 1.

See Principle 13, para. 1.

See Principle 9.

Kalin, ‘How Hard is Soft Law? The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and the Need for a Normative Framework’, 6.

Kalin, ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement as International Minimum Standard and Protection Tool’, 28.

Cohen, ‘The Development of International Standards to Protect Internally Displaced Persons’, 83.

See Patrick L. Schmidt, ‘The Process and Prospects for the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement to Become Customary International Law: A Preliminary Assessment’, Georgetown Journal of International Law 35 (2003–2004): 483–519; Marco Simons, ‘The Emergence of a Norm Against Forced Relocation’, Colombia Human Rights Review 34 (2002), 95–156.

Elizabeth Ferris, ‘Assessing the Impact of the Principles: An Unfinished Task’, Forced Migration Review (2008): 10.

Recommendation 1631(2003), text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of the Assembly, on 25 November 2003.

Resolution 1286 (2000).

GA Res. 54/167, 17 December 1999.

See E/CN.4/RES/1998/50.

Cohen, ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement: An Innovation in International Standard Setting’, 469.

See E/CN.4/RES/2005/46.

For a summary of states' views regarding the Comprehensive Study by the SGR, see Summary Record of the 40th Meeting, E/CN.4/1993/SR.40(1993), at paras 82–3.

See Simon Bagshaw, ‘Internally Displaced Persons at the Fifty-Fourth Session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, 16 March–24 April 1998’, International Journal of Refugee Law 10 (1998): 548–56.

See for example, United Nations, Report of the Secretary-General to the Economic and Social Council, Strengthening the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance, UN Doc. E/1998/67, 12 June 1998.

GA/RES/250/60, para. 3.

Brookings–Bern Project on Displacement, A Framework for Durable Solutions: When Displacement Ends (Washington, DC: Brookings Institute, 2007).

Ibid.

Mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons, A/HRC/Res/14/6 (2010).

Report of the 13th Special Session of the Human Rights Council, A/HRC/S-13/2.

Human Rights and Natural Disasters: Operational Guidelines and Field Manual on Human Rights Protection in Situations of Natural Disaster (Washington, DC, 2008).

AU Executive Council, Decision on the Situation of Refugees, Returnees and Displaced Persons, AU Doc. EX.CL/Dec.284 (IX), 25–29 June 2006 and EX/CL/Dec.127 (V).