High Commissioner’s Dialogue: Focus on cities and urban settings

On 9 December, António Guterres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), opened a two-day international dialogue that brought together 300 delegates in Geneva to focus on the pressing problems faced by the increasing numbers of refugees and other forcibly displaced people living in cities and towns around the world.

At the opening of his third annual Dialogue on Protection Challenges, Mr. Guterres said growing urbanization was “compounded by influxes of displaced people obliged to abandon their homes by the threat of armed conflict, political violence, lawlessness, food insecurity, environmental degradation and natural disasters. By all indications, this dimension of urbanization will intensify in the future.”

He also noted that evidence shows that high urbanization in States in conflict does not necessarily diminish when conflict ends and to rely exclusively on the traditional solution of repatriating refugees and returning internally displaced persons to their places of origin in rural areas is “increasingly implausible.” He noted that more than half of the world’s people now live in cities, while there are an estimated 5 million refugees [out of 10.5 million] under UNHCR’s mandate and many more millions of internally displaced people living in urban areas. Mr. Guterres said he hoped this year’s Dialogue would encourage policymakers to consider afresh the wisdom of encampment as a policy where and when other solutions may be better for the refugees and the host countries themselves.

Recognizing the growing importance of cities for its work, UNHCR issued a new policy on refugee protection and durable solutions in urban settings in September 2009. The report drew much from the agency’s experience helping Iraqi refugees in the Syrian and Jordanian capitals, Damascus and Amman.

“The new, more clearly rights-based policy emphasizes the fact that UNHCR’s mandated responsibilities towards refugees are not affected by their location. It recognizes that cities and towns are legitimate places for refugees and displaced populations to reside and to enjoy their basic human rights,” the High Commissioner told delegates, including mayors and other municipal authorities, aid workers, experts, refugees, and government representatives.

“The policy does not intend to disregard or subordinate national laws. Quite the opposite, the policy is built upon national legal structures, fully cognizant of the national legal and policy frameworks in which it has to be implemented. The policy aims both to encourage and contribute to the progressive development of these frameworks to ensure that refugees and others of concern in urban areas can be integrated into the social fabric of cities and towns in an appropriate, rights-respecting way,” he added.

However, Mr. Guterres also stressed that the policy “is not an endorsement for all refugees to move to cities,” further noting that the policy, which will be implemented in a phased approach, “commits UNHCR to advocating for the expansion of ‘protection space’ in urban areas and affirms our commitment to designing urban programmes based on principles of age, gender and diversity mainstreaming.”

The High Commissioner concluded that a new approach, based on three closely related principles, was needed to meet the challenge of urban displacement: the new approach cannot be undertaken in isolation from the broader context of marginalized populations in urban settings and particular attention must be given to protecting the rights of poor and disadvantaged communities; it must be both developmental and relief-based – one that addresses long-term as well as immediate needs and supports the broader process of urban planning and poverty reduction; and the approach must be inclusive and requires establishing and strengthening partnerships with central governments, municipal and local authorities, NGOs, the private sector and especially the marginalized populations themselves.

The Dialogue was preceded on 8 December by a roundtable meeting of mayors from more than 20 towns or cities.

See also:

2009 High Commissioner’s Dialogue

Challenged for Persons of Concern to UNHCR in Urban Settings

Concept Paper: High Commissioner’s Dialogue on Protection Challenges Challenges for persons of concern to UNHCR in urban settings

2009 Dialogue: Related Themes

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