Daily Times

‘One refugee without hope is too many’ is the message behind the UNHCR’s ‘One’ campaign that started last week. On the 50th anniversary of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, the United Nations General Assembly adopted Resolution 55/76 where it was decided that June 20 would be celebrated as World Refugee Day. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees is “the key legal document in defining who is a refugee, their rights and the legal obligations of states”. A refugee, as per Article 1 of the 1951 convention, is defined as an individual who has a “well-founded fear of prosecution because of his or her race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, and is unable or unwilling to avail himself or herself of the protection of that country, or to return there, for fear of prosecution”.

Unfortunately, Pakistan is not one of the 147 states that are signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention or the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. This comes as very surprising considering the fact that Pakistan dealt with a huge number of refugees from India post-partition in 1947 and was host to 3.6 million Afghans, as per UNHCR estimates, at the peak of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, followed by another influx post the 2001 Operation Enduring Freedom by US forces. Of these, around 1.7 million, one of the largest populations of its kind, still remain in Pakistan. Additionally, according to UNHCR figures, there are around one million people still displaced due to the 2009 emergency in FATA and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The reason South Asian states did not sign the Refugee Convention was because it was considered too ‘Euro-centric’. However, according to UNHCR, the 1967 protocol removed these limitations and thus gave the convention universal coverage. Pakistan has been very generous with refugees, and signing this convention holds several advantages for us.

First, according to former Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar, signing the convention could lead Pakistan to a better position to defend its sovereignty by stopping unwanted movements on its borders, because the Convention ceases to apply to a person who, according to Article 1, section C of the Convention, “voluntarily re-avails himself to the protection of the country of his nationality”, which would apply to the Afghan nationals that continue to cross the border and come back. This could also help improve security and anti-terrorism efforts as illegal immigrants will be distinguished from refugees. Second, Pakistan would also be in a better position to demand assistance and aid once it signs the Convention as, in 2002, Pakistan closed its borders to Afghan refuges on the pretext of shortage of funds and assistance to protect and sustain them. Third, the 1951 Convention is in accordance with Islamic teachings, practiced in Madina at the time of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) when people from Madina received immigrants from Makkah as refugees. Fourth, signing the Convention would make refugee management more effective and efficient as a complex web of government agencies such as SAFRON, CCAR and NADRA manage the refugee population. The registration of refugees under regularised standard operating procedure could prevent the misuse of asylum and naturalisation procedures, according to experts. Moreover, there would be no need for special agreements such as the Tripartite Agreement between UNHCR, the government of Afghanistan and government of Pakistan.

According to UNHCR, “The Convention is both a status and rights-based instrument and is underpinned by a number of fundamental principles, most notably non-discrimination, non-penalisation and non-refoulement.” These principles are important for Pakistan to adopt in the light of international human rights law, as well as refugee law. According to a 2009 Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) report, ‘Afghan refugees in Pakistan: push comes to shove’, many Afghans have been forced to return to Afghanistan, despite a constantly deteriorating law and order situation there. Further, according to reports, Pakistani authorities allegedly offered Afghan refugees the option of residing either in camps near the unsafe border where food supply would be guaranteed, or in camps in Peshawar where they would be safe, but without a guaranteed supply of food. Non-refoulement, enshrined in Article 33 of the Convention, is a principle in international law that concerns the protection of refugees from being returned to places where their lives or freedoms are threatened. Despite Pakistan not being bound by the 1951 Convention, the principle of non-refoulement is part of international customary law, and must be respected to safeguard innocent lives under threat of persecution.

It is interesting to note here that due to Pakistan not being a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, the millions of displaced Afghans residing in camps and elsewhere in Pakistan were never legally defined as refugees. Rather, the laws of the Foreigners Act 1946 applied to them, hence equating them with illegal aliens. They are given proof of registration (PoR) cards issued by NADRA for identification. This is because no Pakistani legal instrument defined laws for refugees, until the approval of the Foreigners (Amendment) Act 2010 that was tabled in the National Assembly as a private member’s bill by MNA Shireen Arshad Khan, which included the term (d) asylum seeker and (e) refugee to Section 2 of the Act. The implementation of the amendment, however, is yet to be seen and it is important for the police forces to be trained accordingly considering the high incidence of harassment at the hands of security personnel reported by Afghan refugees.

Hence, on this day, it is important for us as Pakistanis as well as our government to realise the importance of respecting the rights of refugees, considering their plight, and continue to give them protection in line with international laws and humanitarian principles. This can also bring a much-needed improvement to our international image.

The writer is a social activist and researcher based in Islamabad. He tweets under the handle @UsamaKhilji and blogs on usamakhilji.wordpress.com