New call to ‘break the impasse’ of decades of internal displacement

(Geneva, 23 June 2017): Over 31 million people across the world were last year uprooted and displaced - within their own countries - by conflict, violence and disasters. Internally displaced persons (IDPs) do not seek protection abroad like refugees and they often remain virtually forgotten on the margins of their societies. For many IDPs, this difficult situation will last years or even decades, contrary to the promises of the Sustainable Development Goals.

A new study, Breaking the Impasse: Reducing Protracted Internal Displacement as a Collective Outcome, commissioned by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), advocates that IDPs should not have to wait until a conflict is fully resolved or all impacts of a disaster are over before they can begin rebuilding their lives. Governments bear the primary responsibility for addressing internal displacement and should, with the international community, regard protracted internal displacement as primarily a development and political challenge, which may also require a continued humanitarian response. To highlight good practices and make concrete recommendations, the study takes a closer look at five countries: the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia, the Philippines, Somalia and Ukraine.

“Today, some of the most vulnerable women, men and children are stuck in protracted internal displacement with a highly uncertain future,” said Stephen O’Brien, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. “Governments and humanitarian, development and human rights actors must work together to break this impasse.”

The study’s authors - Walter Kälin, the former Representative of the Secretary-General for the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons, and Hannah Entwisle Chapuisat, an experienced displacement researcher - recommend supporting IDPs to achieve self-sufficiency and ultimately end their protracted displacement. It is essential for key stakeholders – particularly development and humanitarian actors – to jointly analyze the reasons why displacement has become protracted, and ensure those underlying causes are addressed. IDPs and host communities also need to be part of the planning decisions affecting them, and donors should provide multi-year, flexible funding that transcends the humanitarian-development divide.

Next year marks the twentieth anniversary of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, which were introduced to improve the collective response to internal displacement. Mr. O'Brien today at the ECOSOC Humanitarian Affairs Segment in Geneva called for a high-level event on internal displacement to be held in 2018 to showcase the initial impacts of this new approach for IDPs and secure commitments from governments, organizations, donors, civil society and the private sector.

The Breaking the Impasse study is available online Breaking the Impasse: Reducing Protracted Internal Displacement as a Collective Outcome