The protection of victims of arbitrary displacement
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Text
adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of
the Assembly, on 19 March 2021 (see Doc. 15219, report of the Committee on Migration, Refugees and
Displaced Persons, rapporteur: Mr Fabien Gouttefarde). See
also Recommendation 2197
(2021).
1. The Parliamentary Assembly is deeply
alarmed by estimations of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees that nearly 80 million persons globally have been displaced
by force, most of them being displaced inside their country. Africa,
in particular, suffers due to armed conflicts, terrorism and general violence,
causing extremely high numbers of victims of arbitrary displacement,
many of whom seek refuge in other countries in Africa and sometimes
in Europe.
2. Arbitrary displacement occurs where the civilian population
is targeted intentionally in armed conflicts and where homes and
civilian infrastructure are destroyed. In its most heinous form,
such displacement is perpetrated for the political purpose of displacing
an ethnic group from a conflict area, which is euphemistically referred
to as “ethnic cleansing”. Arbitrary displacement often also enables
the aggressor to expropriate and exploit natural resources in the
wake of an armed conflict or to pursue criminal activities to generate
financial benefits, such as through the smuggling of drugs, oil,
weapons or stolen cultural goods.
3. Recalling its
Resolution
2214 (2018) “Humanitarian needs and rights of internally
displaced persons in Europe”, the Assembly strongly regrets that
nearly 2.8 million Europeans are internally displaced persons according
to estimates by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre in Geneva.
In addition, many Europeans are refugees in other countries, in
particular Ukrainians who fled the war in eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
More recently, the conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region has
brought new waves of displaced persons.
4. The Assembly welcomes the fact that many European countries
have granted asylum to millions of persons forcibly displaced from
their home country, primarily from outside of Europe. Turkey, for
example, received approximately 3.5 million Syrians and Germany
hosts more than one million refugees from Syria and other countries.
5. Recalling that Nadia Murad, a Yazidi woman kept in slavery
and a victim of inhuman and degrading treatment by Daesh in northern
Iraq, received the Assembly’s Václav Havel Human Rights Prize in
2016, the Assembly strongly condemns the use of all forms of sexual
violence as a weapon in armed conflicts. Sexual violence must never
be a weapon of warfare and has to be punished severely by law.
6. In this context, the Assembly reminds member States of the
Council of Europe of the relevant legal standards and obligations
protecting civilian populations against arbitrary displacement,
which have been recognised as general principles of public international
law in the statutes of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg,
the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and
the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. In addition, the
Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) spells out the
prohibition to arbitrarily displace civilian populations and qualifies
such acts as war crimes and crimes against humanity. Therefore,
the Assembly calls on member States to:
6.1 sign and ratify the Statute of the ICC, if they have not
yet done so, and closely co-operate with the ICC in prosecuting
and punishing arbitrary displacement of civilian populations;
6.2 consider creating specific international criminal tribunals
for prosecuting and punishing arbitrary displacement where action
by the ICC cannot be pursued;
6.3 introduce in their national law the principle of universal
jurisdiction of national courts regarding war crimes and crimes
against humanity involving forms of arbitrary displacement;
6.4 establish truth commissions in accordance with
Resolution 1613 (2008) “Use
of experience of the ‘truth commissions’”.
7. Recalling the United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal
Displacement of 1998 and the African Union Convention for the Protection
and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (Kampala
Convention), the Assembly calls on member States to:
7.1 co-operate closely with the
African Union in the framework of the Kampala Convention in the prosecution
and punishment of arbitrary displacement of civilian populations
in Africa;
7.2 implement the United Nations Guiding Principles on Internal
Displacement in their national law.
8. Recalling the European Convention on Human Rights (ETS No.
5, the Convention), the Assembly calls on each member State to prosecute
and punish, using all avenues available under national and international law,
any violations of human rights committed by third parties abroad
against persons who have subsequently received international protection
status in the respective member State. Member States should also
assist victims in seeking legal redress where violations have occurred.
Arbitrary displacement and other related war crimes and crimes against
humanity could typically violate:
8.1 the
right to life under Article 2 of the Convention;
8.2 the prohibition of torture under Article 3 of the Convention;
8.3 the right to liberty and security under Article 5 of the
Convention;
8.4 the protection of private and family life under Article
8 of the Convention;
8.5 the protection of property under Article 1 of the first
Protocol to the Convention (ETS No. 9).
9. Aware that arbitrary displacement has the objective of generating
financial benefits for those perpetrating such displacement, the
Assembly calls on member States to increase their efforts in the
search and seizure of proceeds from crimes committed in the wake
of armed conflicts, in accordance with:
9.1 the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized
Crime;
9.2 the Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure and Confiscation
of the Proceeds from Crime (ETS No. 141) and the Council of Europe
Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure and Confiscation of the
Proceeds from Crime and on the Financing of Terrorism (CETS No. 198);
9.3 the Council of Europe Convention on Offences relating
to Cultural Property (CETS No. 221).
10. Given that the prosecution and punishment of arbitrary displacement
requires effective law-enforcement co-operation at international
level, the Assembly calls on member States to:
10.1 respect their obligations under
the European Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters
(ETS No. 30);
10.2 respond to requests for extradition under the European
Convention on Extradition (ETS No. 24);
10.3 closely co-operate with other member States in identifying
and combating terrorist organisations which commit arbitrary displacement.
11. Aware of the serious personal impact of arbitrary displacement
upon victims, the Assembly calls on member States to provide assistance
to victims of such displacement through:
11.1 accelerated asylum procedures in accordance with its
Resolution 1471 (2005) “Accelerated asylum
procedures in Council of Europe member States”;
11.2 special medical and psychological care;
11.3 action for family tracing and the enabling of family reunification;
11.4 the prosecution of crimes committed against victims.
12. An effective protection of civilian populations against arbitrary
displacement through an armed conflict may require the multilateral
provision of security through the deployment of police or military
forces. Therefore, the Assembly invites member States to contribute
to such deployment through:
12.1 a
mandate of the United Nations Security Council;
12.2 co-operation with the internationally recognised government
of a State affected by an armed conflict;
12.3 bilateral or multilateral co-operation agreements, such
as the North Atlantic Treaty or the Common Foreign and Security
Policy of the European Union.
