This article is written by Ms. Sreya Saloni a 2nd year student of Lloyd Law College, Greater Noida.
Abstract
This article examines the international definitions of refugee adopted from 1920-1950 and provides commentaries on three trends in the definition. In the initial phase of international refugee definitions, refugees were defined in juridical terms. This perspective, from 1920-1935, held that the refugee is a member of a group that has no freedom of international movement because its members have been effectively deprived of the formal protection of their government. The League of Nations responded to assist Russian refugees who had fled the Russian Revolution, Armenian refugees from Turkey and others living under analogous conditions. The primary concern was to assist victims deprived of the de jure protection of their country. Concern for include those who have suffered from social and political unrest characterized the second phase of the concept of refugee. From 1935 to 1939, new definitions of refugees arose in this social viewpoint, extending the concept of de jure protection to include aid for victims of social and political events that led to a de facto, if not a de jure, loss of State protection. In response to National Socialism in Germany, which resulted in a severe refugee crisis, a new concept of refugee was created. The individualist perspective on refugee status has not yet gained traction. Between 1938 and 1950, the third phase of the concept of a refugee focused on the interaction between a person and their state. This new definition defined a refugee as someone who, up to the point at which he either did not need help or was deemed unworthy of it, may be either a legitimate political dissident or a victim of acknowledged official intolerance. In conclusion, the author argues that the term of refugee is a flexible legal construct that has to be updated to reflect shifting social and political contexts.
Introduction of the Topic
The protection of human lives, freedoms, and dignity is the shared goal of international refugee law (IRL), international human rights law, and international humanitarian law. These legal systems are thought to be complimentary to one another. In turn, international refugee law emerged in the 20th century with the goal of creating and putting into place systems for the protection of those who have been forcefully relocated because to a legitimate fear of persecution.
International refugee law was initially nation-specific in the early half of the 20th century, meaning that it primarily targeted those who had been forcefully displaced from particular governments. States have only implemented the current system for refugee protection after the end of World War II, in the context of the newly formed United Nations.
The 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (the 1951 Convention), which defines who is eligible for refugee status and contains the rights associated with it, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), which was established in December 1950, form the two pillars of this system, which is global in scope.
Evolution of the law
An important upheavals occurred in the participating States, particularly in the Russian Empire, as a result of the League of Nations period World War I (1914–1918), its precursors (the Balkan Wars, 1912–1913), and its aftermath in the Near East (the wars in the Caucasus, 1918–1921, and the Greco-Turkish War, 1919–1922). Between 1918 and 1922, as well as subsequently, a sizable number of refugees (estimates range from one to two million) fled Russian and later Soviet lands for other nations in Europe, Asia Minor, Central Asia, and East Asia.
Charitable organizations mostly provide emergency aid. These groups were unable to provide more than just material support, though. Moreover, there was no central organization for coordination, and resources were running low. It was decided to invite the Council to appoint a High Commissioner to define the status of refugees, to secure their repatriation or employment outside Russia, and to coordinate measures for their assistance at a conference called by the Committee of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the League of Red Cross Societies on February 16, 1921. It should take on several shapes. The initial proposal was agreed in principle by the Council on June 27, after taking into account the responses received. The Council also directed the Secretariat to conduct some preliminary investigation.The President of the Council was free to choose who would be appointed as a High Commissioner. On September 1, 1921, Dr. Fridtjof Nansen accepted the commission.
Tragic events that occurred in the Ottoman Empire far before World War I had an impact on a number of ethno-religious communities, including the Armenians, who are the victims most commonly mentioned. Jacobite Syrians, Chaldeans, and Assyrians are the three groups of Nestorians.Other Muslim communities who suffered were Turks and Kurds.The Greeks who made it through the massacres and the Greco-Turkish and Balkan Wars teamed up with their Turkish or Bulgarian counterparts to participate in the “facultative mutual” exchange of populations that was facilitated by the Greek-Turkish Agreement (May 1914), the Treaty of Neuilly (1919), the Treaty of Constantinople (1913), the Turkish-Bulgarian Treaty (1913), and the Greek-Turkish Treaty (1923). Lastly, the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) mandated the forced migration of Greek and Turkish populations.
The High Commissioner of the League of Nations was expanded to include Armenians in 1924 and other categories of refugees in 1928. During the League of Nations period (1921-1946), several institutions were established to perform the High Commissioner’s tasks, including the Nansen International Office and the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees.
The duty of providing global protection
Based primarily on international legal agreements reached within the framework of the League of Nations, these organizations provided refugees with international protection. The initial Agreements made on July 5, 1922, May 31, 1924, and May 12, 1926, defined Russian and Armenian refugees and primarily addressed “identity certificates” for them. The governments which adopted the Arrangement relating to the Legal Status of Russian and Armenian Refugees, of 30 June 1928, “having agreed that it is necessary to define more clearly the legal status of Russian and Armenian refugees”, recommended the appointment of representatives of the High Commissioner for Refugees “in the greatest possible number of countries”.
the Convention relating to the International Status of Refugees, of 28 October 1933, States Parties for the first time undertook real obligations on behalf of Russian, Armainans and assimilated refugees. Nine States, including France and the United Kingdom, the two most powerful nations at the time, ratified the Convention of 1933.However, the second paragraph of Article 3 was rejected by the UK. However, this Convention was the reason for it. Non-refoulement become a cornerstone of international treaty law. Two accords reached to offer protection to refugees leaving Germany should be mentioned: the Provisional Agreement about the Status of Arriving Refugees. The resolution that the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees (IGCR) enacted in Evian on July 14, 1938, to establish its powers, is another piece of international law from that era. The President Franklin D. Roosevelt summoned the Evian summit “for the primary purpose of facilitating involuntary emigration from Germany (including Austria)” outside of the official League of Nations framework. comprising “(1) individuals who have not yet left their nation of origin (Germany, including Austria), but who are forced to emigrate due to their political views, religious convictions, or racial heritage, and (2) individuals as defined in who have already left their nation of origin but have not yet established themselves permanently elsewhere.”
Protection was for the first time given to prospective refugees inside their intended nation of departure. The IGCR’s member states in February 1939 designated the recently appointed High Commissioner for Refugees, whose main office was located in London, as Director. On June 30, 1947, the IGCR came to an end, which was six months after the High Commissioner’s office closed. The “Nansen refugees” were also protected by the IGCR at that time.
The period from 1946–1951
The International Refugee Organization marked a significant turning point in international protection. Founded on Established on December 15, 1946, by UN General Assembly Resolution 62 (I), it operated as the International refugee’s Preparatory Commission from July 14, 1947, to August 20, 1948, then as the International refugee organisation itself from August 1948 until its abolition on February 28, 1952.
Since its major function was to transfer 1,049 refugees and internally displaced people—mostly from Central Europe—into the United States, Australia, Israel, Canada, and Latin America, the organisation earned a reputation as a resettlement agency. Nonetheless, the organisation was “entrusted with the legal and political protection of persons who are its concern,” per its Constitution. Since then international refugees organisation’s agreements with countries include a general language attesting to its authority to offer protection, and they frequently say certain facets of organisation refugees’ status. In certain ways, the international refugees organization took on the function of a supranational organization, in contrast to earlier or later international organizations.
The initial plan was for the International Refugee Organisation to end its operations on June 30, 1950.It quickly became apparent that there was little chance, if any, that the refugee crisis would be resolved by then.
he UN General Assembly voted on December 3, 1949, “to establish, as of 1 January 1951, a High Commissioner’s Office for Refugees” and on December 14, 1950, adopted the Statute of the UN Permanent International Machinery.
As a result, under the terms of its Statute, the High Commissioner of the United Nations has been in charge of providing international protection for refugees from January 1, 1951.In the meanwhile, an increasing number of States have ratified and put into effect the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, which is known as the magna carta for refugees.
Conclusion
The development of the whole body of international human rights legislation is intimately linked to the beginnings of refugee rights. The refugee rights regime, like international human rights, is a twentieth-century creation. Just after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was ratified, the United Nations codified it in the modern era, heavily inspired by the normative framework of the Declaration.
Fundamentally speaking, however, the refugee rights system significantly references older precedents, such as international attempts to safeguard national minorities and the law of liability for damage to foreigners. The conceptual contributions that each of these organizations of international law made to the formation of particular treaties governing the human rights of refugees are highlighted in this chapter.
Reference
Author Vanessa Holzer
The 1951 Refugee Convention | UNHCR
INTERNATIONAL REFUGEE LAW on JSTOR
On the history of the international protection of refugees (icrc.org)