Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

In international law “refugee” refers to individuals who are residing outside of their country of origin and who are unable or unwilling to return because of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion. The term derives from the Latin refugere – to flee – and is believed to have first been applied to the Huguenots who fled France in the seventeenth century. Its modern legal usage follows the UN General Assembly's establishment of the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) in 1950. Within a system of nation-states with fixed borders, and a burgeoning Cold War rivalry, the UNHCR's principal aim was to guarantee and provide international protection and assistance to individuals who had become displaced by World War II. By becoming signatories to the 1951 UN Convention, nation-states agreed to grant special protection on an international basis to citizens of a state that could not guarantee their human rights and physical security. This remit for protection was later extended beyond Europe to encompass refugees from all over the world, as the problem of displaced people became more global, with the signing of the 1967 Bellagio Protocol. There are currently 137 states that are signatories to both the 1951 Convention and Bellagio Protocol. The Convention defines a refugee as any ... log in or subscribe to read full text