Newsletter - January 2010
Displaced Persons
On
11 January 2010 the Department of International Law
met with the Representative of the Secretary General
of the United Nations on the Human Rights of
Internally Displaced Persons, Dr. Walter Kälin. In
addition to being a world renowned academic authority
in the field of international law, Dr. Kälin played a
leading role in drawing up the Guiding Principles for
Internally Displaced Persons, the principal
international instrument for the protection of and
assistance to internally displaced people. Dr. Kälin
was accompanied by Mr. Andrew Solomon, Director of
the Berns-Brookings Project on Internal Displacement,
which provides support to the Representative of the
Secretary General to optimize the performance of his
functions.
The purpose of the meeting was to become familiar
with the work of the Representative of the U.N.
Secretary General with regard to internally displaced
people, both at the global and regional levels, and
also to report on the OAS’ work in that field.
Attending the meeting were the lawyers from the
Department of International Law as well as
representatives of other areas of the Secretariat for
Legal Affairs and the General Secretariat. The
meeting was held at the offices of the Department of
International Law.
Numerous proposals for collaboration resulted from
the visit, both with the office of the Representative
of the Secretary General of the United Nations on the
Human Rights of Internally Displaced People, and with
the Brookings Institution. These include
participation of representatives of these
institutions in Department of International Law
activities to disseminate and promote international
law, the possibility of introducing into the
Inter-American System a process to analyze the recent
international convention on internally displaced
persons adopted by the African Union, and the
possibility of preparing model laws for implementing
the Guiding Principles at the internal level, among
others.
The Organization of American States has been
concerned for decades with the issue of internally
displaced persons. Every year it adopts a resolution
expressing its concern for the well-being of
displaced persons, urging the States and the
international community to continue to make efforts
to provide protection and assistance to internally
displaced people.
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