UNHCR Engagement STOCKTAKING with National … · 4 UNHCR Engagement with National Human Rights Institutions for IDP Protection MNLF Moro National Liberation Front (Philippines) MORR

UNHCR Engagement with National Human Rights Institutions for IDP Protection

Authored by: Stacey White for UNHCR

February 2016

STOCKTAKING EXERCISE

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acronyms .................................................................................................................................................. 4

Executive summary ................................................................................................................................ 6

1. Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 8

Scope ............................................................................................................................................................. 10

Methodology ............................................................................................................................................... 11

2. Background ..................................................................................................................................... 12

UNHCR’s role in IDP protection ................................................................................................................ 12

NHRIs role in IDP protection ..................................................................................................................... 13

3. Case studies .................................................................................................................................... 16

Afghanistan ................................................................................................................................................. 18

Colombia ...................................................................................................................................................... 22

Kenya ............................................................................................................................................................. 26

Nigeria ........................................................................................................................................................... 32

Philippines .................................................................................................................................................... 36

Annex: Summary of case studies ..................................................................................................... 46

Afghanistan ................................................................................................................................................. 46

Colombia ...................................................................................................................................................... 47

Kenya ............................................................................................................................................................. 48

Nigeria ........................................................................................................................................................... 49

Philippines .................................................................................................................................................... 50

Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 51

© United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, February 2015Cover/back cover photos: © UNHCRLayout & design: BakOS DESIGN

ACRONYMS

AAN Afghanistan Analysts Network

AGE Anti-government entities (in the context of Afghanistan)

AIHRC Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission

ANDMA National Authority on Disaster Management (Afghanistan)

ANSF Afghan National Security Forces

ARMM Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (Philippines)

BBC British Broadcasting Corporation

CAB Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (Philippines)

CCCM Camp Coordination and Camp Management

CHR Commission on Human Rights (Philippines)

DIP Division of International Protection (UNHCR)

DSWD Department of Social Welfare and Development (Philippines)

ELN Ejército de Liberación Nacional, National Liberation Army (Colombia)

FARC Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia

HCT Humanitarian country team

ICC International Coordinating Committee (of NHRIs)

ICGLR International Conference on the Great Lakes Region

ICRC International Committee of the Red Cross

IDMC Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre

IDP Internally displaced person

IIHL International Institute of Humanitarian Law

IMCC Inter-Ministerial Coordination Committee on Refugees, Returnees, and IDPs (Afghanistan)

IOM International Organization for Migration

ISAF International Security Forces (Afghanistan)

ISIL Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

KNCHR Kenya National Commission on Human Rights

LEMA Local Emergency Management Agencies (Nigeria)

MILF Moro Islamic Liberation Front (Philippines)

4 UNHCR Engagement with National Human Rights Institutions for IDP Protection

MNLF Moro National Liberation Front (Philippines)

MORR Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation (Afghanistan)

MoSSP Ministry of State for Special Programmes (Kenya)

MOU Memorandum of Understanding

MPC Mindanao Protection Cluster (Philippines)

MRRD Ministry for Rural Rehabilitation and Development (Afghanistan)

NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization

NCFR National Commission for Refugees and IDPs (Nigeria)

NDRRMC National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (Philippines)

NFIs Non-food items

NGOs Non-governmental organizations

NHRC National human rights commission

NHRI National human rights institution

NRC Norwegian Refugee Council

OCHA Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

ORN Operation Rudi Nyumbani (Kenya)

PEV Post-election violence

ProCap Protection Standby Capacity Project

PSC Parliamentary Select Committee on the Resettlement of IDPs (Kenya)

PWG Policy Working Group on IDPs (Afghanistan)

PWGID Protection Working Group on Internal Displacement (Kenya)

SEMA State Emergency Management Agencies (Nigeria)

TSI Transitional Solutions Initiative (Colombia)

UN United Nations

UNAMA United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan

UNDP United Nations Development Programme

UNGA United Nations General Assembly

OHCHR Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund

U.S. United States

A Stocktaking Exercise 5

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

UNHCR is broadly recognized as the global leader in the protection of displaced and conflict-affected populations. Whilst the UN Refugee Agency is first and foremost mandated to lead and coordinate international action on behalf of refugees and stateless persons, UNHCR’s accumulated experience and expertise in protection has led it to offer more reliable and predictable responses in situations of internal displacement as well. In order to coordinate and deliver protection in situations of internal displacement, UNHCR has come to employ a range of interrelated strategies, one of which involves engaging in strategic partnerships with national human rights institutions (NHRIs). These human rights institutions are state bodies, funded by governments but with independent mandates to protect and promote human rights. As such, they are natural partners for UNHCR and the protection cluster in their roles to promote the protection of and assistance to IDPs.

Traditionally, NHRIs have functioned in the human rights and development spheres only, operating in a complaints-driven manner. However, over the past ten to fifteen years, NHRIs have also attuned their functions to become not only more aware of the protection concerns of IDPs, but also more focused and operational in their advocacy on behalf of these populations. With the support of UNHCR, NHRIs have become active in protection clusters and in national level working groups for IDPs. They have established institutional IDP focal points and IDP units. They have also expanded the strength of their presence in provinces for IDP protection monitoring which, in turn, has allowed them to gather systematic data on IDPs that can influence the actions of government and non-government actors. Further to promoting the enhanced operational role of NHRIs, UNHCR has at the same time been increasingly active in encouraging the development and implementation of IDP legislation and policy by relevant government ministries. This has often been done in tandem with NHRIs under the auspices of multi-stakeholder technical working groups.

In countries where UNHCR has the human and financial resources to cultivate a strong partnership with NHRIs, the positive impact is undeniable. The work clearly raises the visibility of IDP issues. It also promotes government accountability, improves access to vulnerable populations, and even has a positive impact on civil society organizations seeking to raise their own voice on behalf of IDPs. Findings from this study are fairly straight-forward. NHRIs simply become stronger human rights advocates for IDPs through their partnership with UNHCR. UNHCR’s partnerships with NHRIs are not just about resourcing these national institutions to build their capacities, but are also about the prestige and combined leverage that the two institutions can use to advocate with governments for the benefit of IDPs when they work together.

Still, engagement with NHRIs is challenging and requires UNHCR to play a delicate balancing act. Whilst working with independent NHRIs, UNHCR must also remain focused on its support for government ministries responsible for IDP protection and assistance, the actual State bearers of IDP rights. This requires UNHCR to manage multiple relationships at once, either on its own or through the protection cluster.


Furthermore, it should be noted that while UNHCR country offices have been successful in promoting the protection of IDPs during displacement, they have been less successful in preventing displacement or supporting durable solutions. Although these aspects of IDP rights are always included in national IDP legislation and policy, UNHCR, together with national and international partners, has struggled to find ways in which to support the delivery of rights in this regard. It is clear that the leveraging of NHRIs for humanitarian protection works well and is highly appreciated by national stakeholders. However, once the humanitarian crisis comes to a close but internal displacement continues, there is often a major gap in protection and solutions that can still benefit from an engagement by NHRIs. Does UNHCR continue its engagement? And, if not, who can step in? As such, a clearer articulation of UNHCR’s intended role on both the front and back end of internal displacement would be useful in developing a more widely understood UNHCR “exit strategy” with regard to IDP protection.

In terms of UNHCR’s continued engagement with NHRIs for IDP protection, the study highlights a number of key lessons learnt for UNHCR. These are as follows:

1. NHRI engagement in IDP protection is not automatic in all situations of internal displacement, particularly if the NHRI does not exhibit certain performance characteristics and eventual ownership of IDP issues.

2. In situations where UNHCR has determined that a partnership with the NHRI can facilitate IDP protection, it may consider innovative ways in which to make a longer-term commitment and/or multi-year planning/strategy development to this engagement.

3. In instances where UNHCR launches a partnership with NHRIs, it would do well to identify all other national institutions that can further enhance this engagement through a fully multi-institutional approach.

4. Given the rising number of UN agencies seeking to engage with NHRIs, UNHCR should coordinate with other UN agencies the process of creating a broader UN approach to NHRI partnerships.

5. UNHCR should review the efficacy of its partnerships with NHRIs in the context of displacement prevention.

6. In preparation for responsible disengagement, UNHCR should articulate the purpose of its partnership with NHRIs from the outset and encourage joint projects with development partners prior to its exit.

7. Whilst UNHCR’s financial support of NHRIs has been critical in building their capacities to advocate for IDPs, UNHCR should be careful that its external funding does not jeopardize perceptions of autonomy for these national institutions.


1 . INTRODUCTION

UNHCR is broadly recognized as the global leader in the protection of displaced and conflict-affected populations. Whilst the UN Refugee agency is first and foremost mandated to lead and coordinate international action on behalf of refugees, and stateless persons, UNHCR’s accumulated experience and expertise in protection has led it to offer more reliable and predictable responses in situations of internal displacement as well. Over the last four decades, UNHCR has provided protection and assistance to internally displaced people (IDPs) in more than 24 countries.1 After nearly 10 years of careful IDP policy development, UNHCR’s commitment to engage in situations of internal displacement is now well established with the legitimacy of its role acknowledged by national governments, regional institutions, and international humanitarian and human rights actors.2

In order to coordinate and deliver protection in situations of internal displacement, UNHCR employs a range of interrelated strategies. Priority areas of operational engagement include protection, shelter, and camp coordination and camp management. In situations of armed conflict where the cluster approach has been activated, UNHCR is often responsible for leading the protection cluster and, in many instances, the shelter and camp coordination and camp management (CCCM) clusters as well, thereby affirming its operational readiness and accountability in these situations.3 In addition to its operational interventions, UNHCR prioritizes the promotion of State responsibility and contributes to inter-agency efforts to capacitate States to protect and respond to the needs of IDPs. This can involve support for the development and strengthening of national laws and policies, for training and coordination assistance, and for the mobilization of field-level protection monitoring among other critical efforts.

1 UNHCR, UNHCR’s Engagement in Situations of Internal Displacement: Provisional Guidance, 2014.2 UN General Assembly Resolution 53/125 (1998) and UNHCR Excom Conclusion No. 87(L) provide an operational and

legal framework for UNHCR’s engagement in situations of internal displacement. Regional legal instruments, such as 2009 the African Union Kampala Convention, also take note of UNHCR’s role and engagement in situations of internal displacement.

3 At the global level, UNHCR leads the Global Protection Cluster in both conflict-induced and humanitarian natural disaster crises and co-leads Shelter and Camp Coordination and Camp Management [CCCM] Clusters in conflict situations. At the country level, UNHCR leads the protection cluster, and in many countries the shelter and CCCM clusters in conflict situations. In situations of natural disasters, leadership of the protection cluster is determined by the relative in-country capacities of UNHCR, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights [OHCHR] and the United Nations Children Fund [UNICEF]. UNHCR, UNHCR’s Engagement in Situations of Internal Displacement: Provisional Guidance, 2014.


In addition to its work with relevant government ministries and local authorities to promote State responsibility for IDP protection, UNHCR has also found it useful, from a strategic point of view, to partner with national human rights institutions (NHRIs), usually in concert with protection clusters, in countries affected by internal displacement. NHRIs are a relatively recent phenomenon, one that has grown rapidly since the 1990s. These human rights institutions are state bodies, funded by governments but with independent mandates to protect and promote human rights. They are unique in that they are part of the state apparatus, yet can criticize governments engaged in human rights violations. Effective NHRIs have become a crucial link between governments and civil societies as these institutions help to bridge the protection gap between the responsibilities of the State and the rights of individual citizens.

Traditionally, NHRIs have functioned in the human rights and development spheres only, operating in a complaints-driven manner and affiliated with international organizations such as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). However, over the past ten to fifteen years, these national human rights institutions have also attuned their functions to become not only more aware of the protection concerns of IDPs, but also more focused and operational in their advocacy on behalf of these populations. With the support of UNHCR and protection clusters more broadly, NHRIs have become active in protection platforms and national level working groups for IDPs. They have established institutional IDP focal points and IDP units. They have also expanded the strength of their presence outside the capital for IDP protection monitoring which, in turn, has allowed them to gather early warning data on internal displacement that can influence the actions of government and non-government actors.

Further to promoting the enhanced operational role of NHRIs, UNHCR has at the same time been increasingly active in encouraging the development and implementation of national legislation and policy on internal displacement by relevant government ministries. While UNHCR and NHRIs are not systematically responsible for the drafting of government legislation or policy nor are they able to force such measures on governments, some NHRIs do have the legal authority to review and comment on human rights-related legislation and/or policy at the domestic level, and UNHCR is very often invited to participate in technical working groups established to draft national IDP legislation.4 Through their presence and partnership, therefore, UNHCR and NHRIs are able to foster an environment wherein governments are encouraged to establish appropriate laws and policies.

In countries where UNHCR has the human and financial resources to cultivate a strong partnership with NHRIs, the positive impact is undeniable. The work clearly raises the visibility of IDP issues. It also promotes government accountability, improves access to vulnerable populations, and even has a positive impact on civil society organizations seeking to raise their own voices on behalf of IDPs. Still, this work is challenging and requires UNHCR to play a delicate balancing act. It can do well to build up the capacity of NHRIs, but must also be careful not to support these institutions to such an extent as to jeopardize perceptions of their independence. UNHCR must also remain focused on its support for government ministries responsible for IDP protection and assistance, the actual State bearers of IDP rights, requiring it to manage multiple relationships at once, either on its own or through the protection cluster. Such an intensive consultative process requires significant staff time, ample resources, and expert diplomatic finesse.

4 Even where neither the enabling legislation nor administrative practice requires NHRIs to review national laws for their compliance with international standards, NHRIs may use their general authority to advise government, Parliament, the Judiciary or any other competent bodies and to intervene in discussions on proposed legislative and/or policy initiatives. See UNDP and OHCHR, UNDP-OHCHR Toolkit for collaboration with National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs), December 2010, p. 71, http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Countries/NHRI/1950-UNDP-UHCHR-Toolkit-LR.pdf


Where UNHCR country offices have been less successful in promoting the rights of IDPs through their partnerships with NHRIs or otherwise are in the areas of prevention and durable solutions. Whilst these aspects of IDP rights are always included in national IDP legislation and policy as well as in UNHCR internal guidance on engagement in situations of internal displacement, UNHCR – together with the international community as a whole – has struggled to find ways in which to support the delivery of rights in this regard. Whilst prevention of displacement hinges on the political will of national authorities and could sometimes go beyond the realm of of direct humanitarian action, durable solutions fall more squarely in the ambit of humanitarian and development charges. However, few transitions have included successful durable solutions at scale for IDPs, and UNHCR has yet to develop a suitable exit strategy in these situations. In situations of protracted and/or recurrent displacement, UNHCR may carry on its humanitarian work when national governments and development actors do not step in or it may simply end its activities when the organization funding for IDP operations ends. In both cases, decision-making remains ad hoc without an explicit long-term vision or agency-wide directive as to when and how UNHCR activities for IDPs are to end.

SCOPEIn an effort to bring together different UNHCR expertise and experience in collaborating with NHRIs, UNHCR’s Division for International Protection (DIP) has commissioned the production of this report and compendium of best practices. The primary focus of this report is on UNHCR’s role as a protection actor, although naturally its actions are inextricably linked to its leadership role of the protection cluster in situations where the cluster approach is activated (in three out of five of this report’s case studies). The report and compendium of best practices aims to collate the experiences of UNHCR in its engagement with NHRIs thus far as a means to support a broader and more consistent institutional effort by the agency to work with NHRIs on issues of IDP protection. Given the nascent efforts of UNHCR in its engagement with NHRIs, perhaps more than a compendium of best practices, this report provides an initial stock taking of the diverse experiences of UNHCR in collaboration with NHRIs thus far. It is hoped that the information provided herein will provoke agency-wide discussions about the overall institutional vision for NHRI engagement specifically and for IDP protection more generally.

The report outlines the activities of five UNHCR country offices in this regard. These are Afghanistan, Colombia, Nigeria, Kenya, and the Philippines.5 These case studies were chosen based on their geographic diversity, different causes of internal displacement, and the relatively active role of UNHCR in IDP protection during various periods over the last ten years. In two of the case studies, namely Afghanistan and Kenya, direct partnership with respective NHRIs had all but ceased by the time this study was conducted due to country-level political considerations as well as UNHCR budgetary limitations even though there has not necessarily been an end to the situations of displacement in these countries. These two case studies are perhaps the most interesting as they allow for a review of what happens when UNHCR phases out its activities with NHRIs in the context of protracted and/or recurrent internal displacement.

5 Ukraine was also carefully considered for this study given the important efforts of the government to develop national IDP legislation over the last year. However, UNHCR’s engagement in Ukraine thus far has primarily focused on the government with little collaboration with the Ombudsman’s office, apart from its attendance at protection cluster meetings. Therefore, it was decided to omit this particular case study from this exercise.


Figure 1: Case study country profiles

Country

IDP population at the time of the study

Name of NHRI, date of establishment, website

National law &/or policy on internal displacement, date of establishment

Afghanistan Estimated 915,000 (May 2015)

Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, 2001, http://www.aihrc.org.af

National IDP Policy, endorsed November 2013, launched February 2014.

Colombia 6.3 million Ombudsman’s Office of Colombia (Defensoria del Pueblo), 1992, http://www.defensoria.gov.co

IDP Law No. 387, 1997; Victims Law 1448, 2011.

Kenya No official up-to-date figure; most informed estimate 300,000+

Kenya National Commission on Human Rights, 2011 (successor to body of same name, 2002), http://www.knchr.org

Prevention, Protection & Assistance to IDPS and Affected Communities Act, adopted December 2012. Parliament endorsed draft National Policy, October 2012.

Nigeria 1.5 million Nigeria National Human Rights Commission, 1995, http://nigeriarightts.gov.ng

IDP policy drafted 2012, not yet adopted. No national IDP law.

Philippines 736,500 Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines, 1987, http://www.chr.gov.ph

Internal Displacement Act of 2014 (still being reviewed – adopted by lower House of Representatives in August 2014).

METHODOLOGYThe methodology for the study included a thorough desk review of primary and secondary sources, semi-structured telephone interviews with UNHCR staff in the case study countries, and telephone discussions with additional in-country humanitarian and human rights actors where possible. The researcher attempted to engage relevant NHRI staff in the chosen case study countries but only succeeded in speaking to one (from the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights).6 In total, some 21 individuals with extensive knowledge of UNHCR’s IDP protection activities were interviewed.

In terms of structure, the report is organized as follows: [1] first, it offers a brief background on the role of UNHCR in the protection and assistance of IDPs as well as a short summary of the origins and evolution of NHRIs; [2] then, it describes UNHCR’s engagement with NHRIs in each of the case study countries; [3] and finally, it summarizes the experiences of UNHCR country offices, outlining best practice and proposed future engagement with NHRIs.

6 Where NHRI contact information was made available by UNHCR offices, emails were sent to NHRI representatives. These emails were not returned.


2 . BACKGROUND

Prior to looking specifically at the engagement of UNHCR with NHRIs, it is useful to outline the evo-lution of UNHCR’s role in responding to the protection and assistance needs of IDPs and to summa-rize the development of NHRIs as national mechanisms for human rights promotion and protection.

UNHCR’S ROLE IN IDP PROTECTIONWhilst UNHCR has been engaged in situations of internal displacement for over forty years, its response to internal displacement in the earlier years was based on the expediency of its presence in a particular country for the purposes of refugee protection rather than on a well-understood and clearly articulated policy or mandate for IDP protection. This has changed, however, over the last twenty years, at the same time that the international community - and the UN system in particular - sought to strengthen and rationalize its larger role in response to humanitarian crises.

International efforts to improve the response to IDPs began in the early 1990s with the creation of the mandate of the Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Internal Displacement in 1992 and continued with the adoption of the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in 1998, with the Humanitarian Reform in 2005, and with the Transformative Agenda in 2011. In addition to these important UN inter-agency developments, UNHCR has been requested to respond to situations of internal displacement by the UN Secretary General and the UN General Assembly (GA). The most important GA Resolution authorizing UNHCR mobilization on internal displacement was GA Resolution 48/116 of December 1993 as it outlined the circumstances and protocols by which UNHCR should act.7 In parallel with these important developments, UNHCR began to examine ways in which it could enhance its own performance in this area. The legal and operational rationale behind UNHCR’s engagement in situations of internal displacement is set out in two policy documents published in 2007 for the 39th session of UNHCR’s Standing Committee.8 The authority of these documents was then reaffirmed in 2014 in UNHCR’s Engagement in Situations of Internal Displacement: Provisional Guidance.

7 UNGA, Resolution A/RES/48/116, 20 December 1993, http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/48/a48r116.htm 8 UNHCR, UNHCR’s Role in Support of an Enhanced Humanitarian Response to Situations of Internal Displacement,

for the Standing Committee, 39th meeting, 4 June 2007, http://www.unhcr.org/46641fff2.html; UNHCR, The Protection of Internally Displaced Persons and the Role of UNHCR, Informal Consultative Meeting, 27 February 2007, http://www.unhcr.org/excom/EXCOM/45dd5a712.pdf Other key UNHCR documents on IDP protection can be found at the following link: http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49c3646c149.html


UNHCR’s intention in developing a specific set of principles that can guide its engagement in situations of internal displacement has been to provide more predicable responses to internal displacement within an inter-agency framework that also reinforces the complementarities and synergies between UNHCR’s work with refugees and IDPs. The UNHCR approach to IDPs – and indeed that of the larger international community – is founded on the understanding that whilst IDPs should benefit from the protection of their own governments, this is not always the case because some States are either unwilling or unable to do so. UNHCR’s eight principles of IDP engagement are:

1. Promoting state responsibility

2. Upholding and maximizing synergies with refugee protection and the right to asylum

3. Promoting human rights

4. Applying a community-based approach responsive to age, gender and diversity

5. Responding in partnership

6. Infusing protection principles across clusters in an inter-agency response

7. Promoting comprehensive solutions

8. Disengaging responsibly9

As the first principle of engagement, UNHCR is committed to promoting State responsibility. In accordance with the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, UNHCR seeks to complement, not substitute for the State. It is committed to contributing to inter-agency efforts to capacitate States to protect and respond to the needs of IDPs. In terms of operational priorities on the ground, UNHCR functions as the lead for the three clusters noted above, namely protection, shelter, and camp coordination and camp management in situations of conflict-induced displacement. Within that overall framework, UNHCR prioritizes those activities where it has comparative advantage and unique experience that can add value to the inter-agency response.10

NHRIs ROLE IN IDP PROTECTIONThe history of NHRIs goes way back to 1946, two years prior to the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, when the UN Economic and Social Council invited States to consider establishing NHRIs. However, real progress in their founding did not happen until much later when the first international Workshop on National Institutions for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights took place in Paris in 1991. It was during this workshop that the Paris Principles were developed as the international standards by which NHRIs should comply in their establishment and operations.11

9 As found in UNHCR, UNHCR’s Engagement in Situations of Internal Displacement: Provisional Guidance, 2014.10 UNHCR, UNHCR’s Engagement in Situations of Internal Displacement: Provisional Guidance, 2014.11 The Paris Principles were adopted by the United Nations Human Rights Commission by Resolution 1992/54 of 1992 and by

the UNGA Resolution 48/134 of 1993. See: http://goo.gl/ErBoM6


Accordingly, the presence of NHRIs has become a key factor for States in their implementation of international human rights obligations, particularly for countries experiencing the emergence or re-emergence of democratic rule. In accordance with the 1991 Paris Principles, NHRIs are intended to be State bodies with a constitutional and/or legislative mandate to protect and promote human rights. They are part of the State apparatus and are hence funded, in principle, by the State although in many situations donor contributions have played as critical a role as the State in ensuring the operational solvency of these national institutions. Today, there are well over 100 NHRIs operating around the world, some 70 of which are accredited in full compliance with the Paris Principles (Status A).12

In 1993, the International Coordinating Committee (ICC) of National Institutions for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights was created to promote and strengthen NHRIs in conformity with the Paris Principles. The ICC reviews and accredits NHRIs in compliance with the Paris Principles according to three statuses: A, B, and C. NHRIs receiving an A status are assessed as being in full compliance with the Paris Principles. Of the over 100 NHRIs that exist today, some 71 have A status, 25 have B status (defined as being partially in compliance with the Paris Principles), and 10 have C status (not compliant with the Paris Principles).13

In terms of their structure, NHRIs generally fall into two groups: (i) Commissions and (ii) Ombudsmen. Human Rights Commissions are multi-member committees whereas Ombudsman agencies generally have their powers vested in a single person. Commissions are the predominant model in Africa and Asia and the Pacific. Ombudsman-style NHRIs are common in the Americas and Central Asia. Initially, NHRIs were primarily complaints-driven mechanisms, but this is no longer the case. Today, NHRIs operate with broad mandates that combine a complaints resolution function, an educational function, an advisory function, and a legal reform function.14

With the role to promote and protect human rights, NHRIs advise government and parliament and cooperate with national stakeholders, civil society, regional bodies and international human rights institutions. They promote and protect the rights of specific groups such as women, children, persons with disabilities, and, increasingly, IDPs. They are also responsible for linking human rights to development initiatives. In post-conflict situations, NHRIs can also be given the additional responsibility of supporting or managing peace-building and transitional justice issues.15 NHRIs are unique in that they exist in a special position between States and civil society, offering a neutral space in which to develop human rights laws and policy.

In the 1990s, NHRIs were primarily associated with the United Nations through OHCHR and UNDP. These agencies have been extensively involved in establishing and strengthening NHRIs. In fact, the consolidation of NHRIs is a priority of OHCHR, and activities to support these institutions are carried out through its National Institutions and Regional Mechanisms Section. OHCHR offers technical support and tailored advice on constitutional or legislative frameworks regarding the establishment of NHRIs and their nature, functions, powers, and responsibilities.16 As for UNDP, it often conducts general rule of law programmes in concert with NHRIs under the auspices of its overall development mandate. OHCHR and UNDP reportedly work with over 80 NHRIs worldwide.17

12 See the ICC website for full details on its operations and on the history of NHRIs: http://goo.gl/H96qQT13 See chart of the Status of National Institutions as of 23 May 2014, http://goo.gl/MdHuOf14 Mario Gomez, National Human Rights Commissions and Internally Displaced Persons: Illustrated by the Sri Lankan Experience,

Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement, Brookings Institution, July 2002, http://goo.gl/0qx2hk15 OHCHR, National Human Rights Institutions: History, Principles, Roles and Responsibilities, Professional Training Series No. 4,

2010, http://goo.gl/yDZryu16 UNDP and OHCHR, UNDP-OHCHR Toolkit for collaboration with National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs), December 2010,

http://goo.gl/apH7qw17 UNDP and OHCHR, UNDP-OHCHR Toolkit for collaboration with National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs), December 2010,

http://goo.gl/apH7qw


As State citizens, tIDPs and their rights are also an integral part of the mandate of NHRIs, even though there was initially little focus on IDP protection by these institutions. As human rights and development-oriented institutions, NHRIs were concentrated on the prevention of traditional human rights violations such as torture, summary execution, and arbitrary detention. They also addressed conflict issues separately from internal displacement. It took encouragement, training, and financial support by UNHCR and others to focus the attention of NHRIs on IDP rights.

In countries where UNHCR has been able to nurture a relationship with NHRIs, the investment has paid off many times over. NHRIs often participate in the protection cluster or working groups on protection, have established IDP focal points and/or units within their operational structures, and have even signed Partnership Agreements with UNHCR in order to conduct extensive IDP protection monitoring. From the case studies examined for this report, it would seem that the current emphasis of NHRI/UNHCR collaboration is on the protection of IDPs during displacement. Less work is currently being conducted by the two institutions when it comes to the prevention of displacement or durable solutions.

GOVERNMENT

NHRIs

JUDICIARY

PARLIAMENT CIVIL SOCIETY

Recommend Amicus Curiae

Report Cooperation

Monitor Referral

Advise Consultation

Figure 2: The relationship of NHRIs with other parts of government

Source: UNDP and OHCHR, UNDP-OHCHR Toolkit for collaboration with National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs), December 2010, p. 36 http://goo.gl/apH7qw (needs to be readapted from original)


3 .

CASE STUDIES

The following section looks specifically at the activities of UNHCR, together with protection clusters where they are activated, on behalf of IDPs and in collaboration with NHRIs in the following case study countries: Afghanistan, Colombia, Nigeria, Kenya, and the Philippines. It details the evolution of UNHCR’s relationship with NHRIs for the protection of IDPs with a view to unearthing both strengths and weaknesses of UNHCR’s engagements thus far. Given that each country situation is very specific, the case study descriptions include a contextual account of the situation in which the UNHCR/NHRI collaboration is or has taken place.

COLOMBIA

6.3 million IDPsDefensoria del Pueblo

16

NIGERIA

1.5 million IDPsNigeria National Human Rights Commission (NHRC)

KENYA

309,200 IDPs*Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)

* IDMC estimation as of February 2015.

AFGHANISTAN

850,000 IDPsAfghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC)

PHILIPPINES

736,500 IDPsCommission on Human Rights

(CHR) of the Philippines


OVERVIEW OF INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTInternal displacement in Afghanistan had risen from 400,000 in 2012 to an estimated 915,000 as of end May 2015.18 Many conflict-affected IDPs have been uprooted from their homes multiple times, some for as long as a decade. Both new and long-term IDPs live in harsh conditions with little hope for a durable solution. An added element of complexity to the displacement situation in the country involves Afghan refugees who have returned from Pakistan and Iran, through UNHCR voluntary repatriation programs or spontaneously, but who have been unable to return to their places of origin due to insecurity.19 Alongside conflict, natural disasters such as drought, earthquakes, avalanches, and flash floods are also a regular cause of displacement in the country.

NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS/INSTITUTIONS ON INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTDuring the course of the protracted conflict in Afghanistan, the Afghan Government has not always been able to exert authority over some of the areas in which internal displacement is taking place. Still, under international guidance, the government has taken some steps to address the situation of IDPs in recent years. In 2009, the government together

18 Several displacement “hotspots” have been identified. These are: Helmand and Kandahar provinces (in the South); Kapisa, Wardan, and Kabul provinces (in the central region); Kunar and Nangarhar provinces (in the East); and Kunduz and Faryab provinces (in the North). UNHCR, Afghanistan: Conflict-induced internal displacement update, 1-28 February, March 2015.

19 MORR, National Policy on Internally Displaced Persons, Government of Afghanistan, 25 November 2013.

AfghanistanAFGHANISTAN INDEPENDENT HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION (AIHRC)

Date of establishment: 2002

Structure: 9 commissioners appointed by president; AIHRC has a total of 605 staff members*

ICC status: “A” since 2007

Period of systematic UNHCR engagement: 2004-2010

INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN AFGHANISTAN

Number of IDPs in country: 850,000 up from 400,000 in 2012**

Protection cluster activation: Yes, since 2008

Primary characteristics of internal displacement:

• Highly volatile political and security situation with increased violence against civilians;

• Complex situation with coexistence of new and protracted displacement;

• New systems being established by government to implement National IDP Policy.

* AIHRC, Annual Report 1389 (2010/2011), 2011, p. 19, found at http://goo.gl/w1GTbZ

** UNHCR, Summary background on conflict-induced IDPs in Afghanistan, 15 April 2015, p. 5.

18

with the humanitarian community set up an IDP Task Force to address policy and operational aspects of the conflict-induced displacement in the country. Then, in 2012, an IDP Policy Working Group (PWG) was created to support the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation (MORR) in the drafting of a National IDP Policy. The establishment of the IDP Task Force, co-chaired by the MORR and UNHCR, was considered necessary due to the intensification of the conflict and the subsequent rise in IDP numbers and needs. The endorsement of the IDP Policy was significant, as it was the first time that the Government of Afghanistan had initiated a national process to comprehensively address the issue of internal displacement.

The National IDP Policy was formally launched in February 2014, and concrete efforts to implement it in select pilot provinces began in September 2014. Whilst the implementation of the policy was supposed to be led by central authorities, political instability at the national level prevented central leadership of the implementation process. Instead, government authorities and international partners working in the provinces affected by internal displacement initiated the process from the ground up.

The IDP Policy sets out the roles and responsibilities of the different government ministries and agencies, humanitarian actors, and other stakeholders in order to secure a predictable and coordinated approach to internal displacement. It stipulates as a priority the creation of action plans at national, provincial and – where necessary – local levels. In addition to articulating the MORR’s position as the institutional focal point for internal displacement at the national level, the policy outlines the roles of other coordinating bodies, including the National Authority on Disaster Management (ANDMA), the National Disaster Management Commission, and the recently established National Board on Migration.20 Unfortunately, the policy leaves some ambiguity over the government leadership role for IDPs, particularly as relates to the interaction between the MORR and the ANDMA as the two main coordinating bodies for conflict and natural disaster-induced displacement respectively. The addition of still newer institutions such as the National Board on Migration, mentioned above, further complicates the situation.

At the national level, the IDP Policy Working Group, chaired by the MORR and co-facilitated by UNHCR, has evolved from a drafting group with a representation of high-level protection actors, most of which were international, to an inter-agency group with a significant presence of national government institutions, including the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC).21 The Working Group is charged with an advisory role for the implementation of the IDP Policy. The implementation of the IDP Policy at provincial levels has initially focused on three identified pilot provinces, namely Nangahar, Balk and Herat. As of mid-2015, progress on implementation had really only taken place in Nangahar, and even in this province, implementation was not happening as fast as expected.22

20 ANDMA coordinates the response to natural disaster-induced displacement and functions as the Secretariat of the Provincial Disaster Management Councils. The National Disaster Management Commission is tasked to address the response of all types of natural and man-made disasters, including conflicts. The National Board of Migration was recently established under the auspices of the President and the MORR as a Secretariat with broad tasks related to IDPs, refugees, returnees, and migration. Key informant interview, June 2015.

21 Other participants include the Ministry for Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD), ANDMA, the Administrative Office of the President, the Office of the First Lady, and the Internal Directorate of Local Governance.

22 That being said, a provincial IDP Policy Implementation Committee has been formed in Nangarhar and similar committees were being established in Balk and Herat by mid-2015. In addition, the drafting of Provincial Action Plans was apparently underway in Nangarhar. UNHCR, Summary Background on conflict-induced IDPs in Afghanistan, 14 April 2015 and key informant interview, June 2015.


UNHCR’S ROLE IN RELATION TO INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTSince 2002, UNHCR has assumed a countrywide leadership and coordination role in Afghanistan in response to conflict-induced displacement, in coordination with the government’s MORR and with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA). Given the limited capacities of the MORR, coordination has largely meant that UNHCR played an increasingly operational role in ensuring the protection of IDPs. The cluster response has been active in Afghanistan since 2008, however, at the field level, cluster presence has reportedly been unstructured and understaffed.23

In relation to the current IDP National Policy, UNHCR has played a number of critical functions. It provided support for the drafting of the National Policy (from 2011-2013), bringing in an IDP Advisor from the Protection Standby Capacity Project (ProCap) to lead the process in collaboration with the MORR.24 UNHCR also currently co-facilitates the National Policy Working Group, supports the MORR at provincial levels through advice to Departments of Refugees and Repatriation (DORRs) in their steering of the Policy Implementation Committees, and also works to support the drafting of Provincial Action Plans. In the context of the worsening humanitarian situation in the country, however, there has been less and less time to focus on institutional/ governance processes with most humanitarian actors, including UNHCR, concentrated on emergency relief.25

UNHCR’S SPECIFIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THE AIHRCUNHCR began a systematic engagement with the AIHRC in 2004/2005 when it initiated an inten-sive programme of joint human rights and IDP/returnee monitoring. This engagement was further strengthened in 2008 when there was a surge in internal displacement in the country. At the time, UNHCR funding and staff for humanitarian operations in Afghanistan were plentiful, and other donors were also supporting the AIHRC, most notably the Canadian government, which contributed significant capacity-building resources to the national human rights institution since its inception.

In 2008, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed between UNHCR and the AIHRC, a series of trainings were conducted for human rights monitors, and UNHCR provided capacity-building resources to the national institution for IDP protection. Furthermore, UNHCR and AIHRC developed a coordinated system of collecting data on IDPs and refugee returnees and released joint reports, though the reports process was generally led by UNHCR rather than the AIHRC. Evidently, the partnership with AICHR was a huge support in expanding humanitarian access to IDPs at the time.26

By 2010, collaboration between UNHCR and AIHRC slowed down for a number of reasons. For one, the security situation in the country had deteriorated rather sharply, forcing humanitarian agencies like UNHCR to focus exclusively on the delivery of emergency humanitarian assistance and protection rather than institutional support. The increase in violence in the country had immediate

23 A humanitarian coordination review process is currently taking place in Afghanistan. Under the auspices of this review, UNHCR has provided strategic inputs proposing a more coherent implementation of the humanitarian reform/ Transformative Agenda with a more predictable presence and role of clusters. UNHCR, Afghanistan: Conflict-induced internal displacement update, 1-28 February, March 2015. For more on clusters in Afghanistan, see http://afg.humanitarianresponse.info/ and key informant interview, June 2015.

24 For more on ProCap, see: https://www.humanitarianresponse.info/en/coordination/procap25 UNHCR, Afghanistan: Conflict-induced internal displacement update, 1-28 February, March 2015.26 Key informant interview, May 2015.


repercussions for the AIHRC as well. In 2010, the AIHRC budget was cut in half, forcing it to suspend many activities and even to postpone the payment of salaries.27

As a result of the overall financial and political challenges experienced by the AIHRC over the last years, its functions and legitimacy weakened, rendering it less of a key strategic partner for UNHCR in its protection of IDPs. It was also around the time of AIHRC’s troubles that the MORR launched multi-agency consultations to develop a National IDP Policy. Therefore, UNHCR was perhaps prudent to disengage from direct collaboration and partnership with AIHRC, opting instead for cooperation with the NHRI through the protection cluster and through the National Policy Working Group (of which both UNHCR and AIHRC are members) as well as through the IDP Task Forces in the provinces.28

LESSONS FROM THE ENGAGEMENTFollowing a fair level of anticipation about the creation of the AIHRC in 2002 and a relatively intensive initial UNHCR engagement, there are a number of factors that ultimately made it less useful for UNHCR to continue its bilateral partnership and direct engagement with the AIHRC. As noted above, the fact that the overall capacity and legitimacy of the AIHRC declined impacted the strategic value of UNHCR’s partnership with AIHRC. At the same time, the focus of UNHCR and other actors has justifiably shifted to the establishment of the IDP Task Forces and Policy Implementation Committees at provincial levels, although these are not dedicated to protection activities. Whilst the political struggles of the AIHRC were one aspect influencing UNHCR’s disengagement, it should also be noted that UNHCR, itself, also had less capacity to focus on IDPs in Afghanistan recent years. With a worsening security situation, a rise in the number of refugees in Afghanistan, and a tightening of UNHCR’s budget for its programmes in Afghanistan, UNHCR had to concentrate more narrowly on its core refugee mandate, leaving it fewer staff and resources overall to focus on IDPs in Afghanistan.

The main lessons learnt from Afghanistan are:

• Building the capacities and skill sets of NHRIs in the area of IDP protection is an important aspect of UNHCR engagement with these institutions. However, if the investment of UNHCR staff time and resources is not resulting in the expected ownership of IDP issues by the NHRI or by national government officials, it may simply not be the right time for UNHCR to engage. In short, UNHCR cannot substitute indefinitely if an NHRI does not take ownership of IDP protection issues.

• Engagement with NHRIs can be a useful and innovative strategy. However, NHRIs need not be the focus of engagement if UNHCR actions for IDP protection are better concentrated on multi-institutional government processes.

• The effectiveness of UNHCR engagement with NHRIs can be more difficult when there is an intensification of fighting and a surge in immediate emergency life-saving response.

27 Sari Kouvo and Kate Clark, “Dismantling Human Rights in Afghanistan: The AIHRC facing a possible downgrading of status,” AAN, 20 September 2013, https://goo.gl/VKIE13

28 There is also talk of transferring cluster responsibilities to national institutions, with the AIHRC slotted to eventually take over the protection cluster leadership responsibilities. Key informant interview, June 2015.


OVERVIEW OF DISPLACEMENTDespite the development of a comprehensive legal system for IDPs by the Colombian government, massive and protracted internal displacement continues to exist in the country. Displacement in Colombia is currently estimated at 6.3 million, the second largest situation of internal displacement in the world behind Syria. There are no IDP camps in Colombia nor is large-scale international aid to these populations required as assistance is provided by the government. Therefore, the role of the international community is very much focused on supporting the technical capacities of State institutions in their continued protection of IDPs.

NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS/INSTITUTIONS ON INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTColombia has the most wide-ranging legislation for IDPs in the world. The first law adopted for IDPs was IDP Law No. 387 in 1997, preceding even the adoption of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in 1998 and also pre-dating the permanent presence of UNHCR in the country, also in 1998.29 The adoption of this law was a substantial achievement as it accorded the issue of IDPs a level of government prioritization and visibility that had never previously been conferred to these vulnerable populations.

Since the time of the 1997 law, there have been many additional presidential decrees and legislative revisions aimed at strengthening the rights of IDPs. A national

29 Prior to the establishment of a permanent UNHCR office in Colombia, a UNHCR representative from Venezuela would cover the country remotely with occasional visits to Colombia. Key informant interview, May 2015.

ColombiaDEFENSORIA DEL PUEBLO


Structure: Ombudsman appointed by president and elected by chamber of representatives; office has total of over 2,000 staff; for IDP affairs, there are 20 staff in Bogota and 100 staff in field offices.*

ICC status: “A”

Period of systematic UNHCR engagement: 1998-present

INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN COLOMBIA

Number of IDPs in country: 6.3 million

Protection cluster activation: Yes, since 2006, but neither the Ombudsman’s office nor the government participates in the clusters.


• Highly legalized environment for IDP protection;

• Focus of international community is on institution-building and state support, not large-scale humanitarian assistance;

• UNHCR has long-standing collaborative relationship with the Defensoria del Pueblo.

* Beth Ferris, Changing Times: The International Response to Internal Displacement in Colombia, Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement, Brookings Institution, December 2014, http://goo.gl/rtVaAc

22

actor that has been central to the assertion of IDP rights is the Colombian Constitutional Court. The Constitutional Court, with significant support from UNHCR, has had a catalytic role in raising awareness of IDP issues and pressuring the government to do more for these vulnerable populations. UNHCR’s role in consistently supporting control organs in Colombia more generally has allowed these national institutions the data and evidence necessary to promote governmental reforms.

It was, in fact, in response to observations by the Constitutional Court and other national stakeholders that IDP rights were not being respected under the 1997 legislation and accompanying decrees30 that a new IDP law was introduced in 2011. This law was called the Victims and Land Restitution Law/Law 1448, commonly referred to as the Victim’s Law. This law has far reaching implications in terms of IDP rights for reparations and restitution. The adoption of this law was a landmark because it proffered the status of “victim” to all IDPs and set as a goal the achievement of reparations for IDPs by 2021. The law also called for the establishment of the Unit for the Assistance and Comprehensive Reparations to Victims (or Victims’ Unit) under the Presidential Association for Social Development. Since the passing of the Victim’s Law, this Victim’s Unit has been operating with 4,500 staff, including 2,500 stationed outside of Bogotá.31

Despite this new IDP legislation and other relevant government actions, improvements in the conditions of IDPs remains limited, and gaps continue to exist in the implementation of public policy.32 With the new law, the focus of the government has been on reparations to victims, but the receipt of a check by an IDP does not necessarily reflect a comprehensive durable solution. Progress on durable solutions is also adversely impacted by government agencies that do not coordinate effectively to develop sustainable solutions for IDPs, ones that address not just monetary reparations, but security issues, housing, public services, and the like.

UNHCR’S ROLE IN RELATION TO INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTUNHCR has had a permanent presence in the country since 1998 and has co-led the protection cluster, together with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), since 2006. UNHCR’s support function, particularly in its relationship with the Constitutional Court, but also with other government institutions has been particularly influential in encouraging the government to develop policies and programs to support IDPs.33

Because there are no camps and minimal distribution of international aid in Colombia, UNHCR and other international organizations have been able to concentrate on the building of institutions and the mainstreaming of IDP protection across sectors and ministries. At the same time, they have been able to promote durable solutions when and where possible. UNHCR and UNDP, in collaboration with local authorities and communities, are currently targeting 17 communities to advocate for sustainable solutions, especially local integration, under the auspices of the Transitional Solutions Initiative (TSI).34 In addition to the TSI, UNHCR has been heavily involved in promoting solutions

30 Constitutional Court decision T-025 among others. See Colombian Constitutional Court, T-025 of 2004, 2004, as found on Brookings Institution website, http://goo.gl/irM6B7

31 Beth Ferris, Changing Times: The International Response to Internal Displacement in Colombia, Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement, Brookings Institution, December 2014, http://goo.gl/FtXxO9

32 UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR country operations profile – Colombia, as accessed 2 June 2015, http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e492ad6.html

33 Beth Ferris, Changing Times: The International Response to Internal Displacement in Colombia, Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement, Brookings Institution, December 2014, p. 29, http://goo.gl/FtXxO9

34 See UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR country operations profile – Colombia, as accessed 2 June 2015, http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e492ad6.html


works under the auspices of other projects as well. A hallmark of UNHCR action in Colombia on behalf of IDPs is its multi-institutional approach, working with several government and quasi-government entities at once to affect change in national policy. These are:

1. Constitutional Court

2. Defensoria del Pueblo

3. Office of the Attorney General

4. Office of the Comptroller General

5. Victims’ Unit

UNHCR’S SPECIFIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THE DEFENSORIA DEL PUEBLOUNHCR’s engagement with the Defensoria del Pueblo is the most continuous and long-standing of its engagements with NHRIs in the world. The Ombudsman’s office was initially established in 1992 with no focus on conflict-related human rights issues. It was not until 1998 when UNHCR opened a permanent office in the country that the UN agency began to support the Ombudsman’s office both technically and financially. One of the first priorities for UNHCR was to help the office change its concentration from traditional human rights violations only to the protection of IDPs, shifting it from a complaints-driven office to a more operational agency with a multitude of field offices. Since 1998, UNHCR has maintained a relationship with the Ombudsman’s office, continually renewing annual MOUs for bilateral partnership.

The bilateral relationship of UNHCR and the Ombudsman’s office is particularly important as neither the Ombudsman’s office nor any government ministries participate in the cluster system in Colombia. Without regular communication on issues of internal displacement through this inter-agency coordination mechanism, UNHCR provides an important linkage between the NHRI and the Victim’s Unit with the Humanitarian Country Team (HCT). Although the OHCHR also works closely with the Ombudsman’s office, OHCHR is not have an operational focus on IDP protection. Other UN agencies that have also initiated an engagement with the Ombudsman’s Office for the pursuit of their specific mandates are UNDP, UN Women, and UNICEF.35

With a presence in every department in the country, the Ombudsman’s office offers critical access to IDPs, even in non-government-controlled areas, allowing for contextual analyses as well as early warning reports that are very useful to government authorities, international agencies, and civil society actors.36 At the sub-national level, the Ombudsman’s office has a strong relationship with local humanitarian teams (managed by OCHA).37 Today, UNHCR, the Swedish government, and the

35 Key informant interview, May 2015.36 The Ombudsman’s early warning reports are assessed as particularly useful in areas where the international community

may not have access to IDP populations, key informant interview, May 2015.37 It has been noted that the Ombudsman’s office may have a closer working relationship with local humanitarian teams than

with the protection cluster on the ground. Local humanitarian teams are managed by OCHA and are established in nine


U.S. government are all major financial contributors to the Ombudsman’s office. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has also assisted the human rights office with the contribution of office laptops and other equipment.38

LESSONS FROM THE ENGAGEMENTAs with other governmental and quasi-governmental entities in Colombia, the Ombudsman’s office is a strong institution. Whilst inherently political, the office has demonstrated a continuous commitment to IDP rights for many years and has built an impressive network of field offices in departments across the country. The office releases as many as 50 reports a year, a significant number of which is focused on early warning for IDPs. These reports are sometimes easily accepted by the government, and at other times, not. Overall, the Ombudsman’s reports are considered effective advocacy tools as local authorities do take careful note of them and do not want to be criticized for the poor conditions of IDPs residing within their jurisdiction. UNHCR’s long-term financial and technical support to the Ombudsman’s office has been highly influential in promoting its ability to advocate credibly and effectively on behalf of IDPs.

The main lessons learnt from Colombia are:

• The continuous, long-term support to the Ombudsman’s office by UNHCR has allowed it to develop real capacities for IDP monitoring and reporting. The success of a long-term approach has been useful with other national human rights institutions as well. For instance, UNHCR worked for eight years with the Constitutional Court to develop the Victim’s Law of 2011 not to mention the years UNHCR has spent supporting the drafting of multiple legislative decrees.39

• Instrumental to UNHCR’s role in promoting IDP protection in Colombia has been its multi-institutional approach. UNHCR works regularly with a number of government and quasi-government entities to advocate for IDP protection. The Ombudsman’s office is one national institution among many that aim to address IDP protection issues. Therefore, it has been important for UNHCR to work will all elements of the national human rights architecture in its strategies for sustainable IDP protection.

• Understanding the personality and political considerations of the particular individual who holds the Ombudsman position has been a key consideration in UNHCR’s strategy for NHRI engagement. The Ombudsman, after all, is an individual with unique networks who favors different approaches depending on his/her background and expertise. UNHCR Colombia has learned to tailor its IDP protection approach to the capabilities and interests of different persons holding the Ombudsman position over the years.

• Although OHCHR, IOM and UNHCR were the only UN agencies initially engaged with the Ombudsman’s office in Colombia, this is no longer the case. Today, UNDP, OCHA, UNICEF, UN Women and still other UN agencies work with the NHRI as well. Given the ever-increasing number of UN agencies working with the Ombudsman’s office, it would be useful to develop rules for engagement for the UN and Humanitarian Country Teams. This would help to rationalize the roles of each of these actors and lessen the transactional burden placed on the Ombudsman’s office.

areas, covering 11 departments. Key informant interview, May 2015.38 Key informant interview, May 2015.39 Key informant interview, May 2015.


OVERVIEW OF DISPLACEMENTSince Kenya’s independence in the early 1960s, the country has experienced repeated population displacements as a result of political and ethnic clashes as well as entrenched land distribution issues originating from the colonial era. Political violence, especially related to elections, has also been a major cause of displacement in Kenya for decades. The most severe episode of post-election violence (PEV) occurred in 2007/2008 when some 1,300 people were killed and another 664,000 people were forced to flee their homes.40 Today, insecurity associated with insurgent attacks by Al Shabaab militants, the uprooting of people in the context of development projects, and natural disasters, particularly floods and drought, are also major causes of displacement.

The IDP situation in Kenya is sometimes termed a “silent humanitarian crisis” as the government no longer has an active protection and assistance program for these vulnerable populations. In 2013, the newly-elected government issued financial return packages to IDPs and closed the IDP camps under the auspices of the Operation Rudi Nyumbani (ORN). Thereafter, it announced that all IDPs from the 2007/2008 post-election violence (PEV), the only IDPs ever officially recognized by the government, had been compensated and returned home when, in fact, tens of thousands of these “integrated” people remain displaced. Further to this older caseload of IDPs, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) estimates that as many as 200,000 people were freshly displaced in the north-east of Kenya in 2014 alone, many of them pastoralists, as a result of increased insecurity and resource

40 Martina Caterina and Johanna Klos, Unfinished Business: Kenya’s efforts to address displacement and land issues in Coast Region, IDMC, NRC, and KNCHR, July 2014, http://goo.gl/diYF9i

KenyaKENYA NATIONAL COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS (KNCHR)

Date of establishment: 2011, successor to body of same name established in 2002.*

Structure: A chairperson and four commissioners are stipulated in the KNCHR Act; today, there are only four commissioners in place. KNCHR has a total of 108 staff.**

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN KENYA

Number of IDPs in country: unknown; IDMC estimates 309,200 IDPs as of February 2015.

Protection cluster activation: No


• Government places little emphasis on internal displacement even though there are many new IDPs in Kenya and thousands of 2007/2008 IDPs who have yet to find durable solutions;

• There has been some progress in developing national legislation for IDPs, but much remains to be done in terms of implementation;

• UNHCR no longer has a budget for reintegration and IDP projects (Pillars 3 & 4)*** and does not currently have a direct partnership with KNCHR.

* There was a new constitution adopted in Kenya in 2010. The current KNCHR was established pursuant to article 59 of that constitution. See http://goo.gl/YCBRIi

** KNCHR, 11th Annual Report, 2013/2014, 2014, http://goo.gl/YAlW9t

*** UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR subregional operational profiles – East and Horn of Africa, http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e45a846.html

26

scarcity.41 Adding to the country’s internally displaced are also the many illegally evicted indigenous people who have been forced to flee ancestral homes in the context of development projects.

NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS/INSTITUTIONS FOR INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTWhilst there have been challenges with the recognition and registration of IDPs by the Government of Kenya, Kenyan authorities have nonetheless made important progress in developing a comprehensive legal and policy framework for internal displacement in the last years. At the time of the 2007/2008 post-election violence (PEV), Kenya had no systems in place or institutional focal points to respond to internal displacement. Immediately following the massive displacements of 2007/2008, the Ministry of State for Special Programmes (MoSSP) was given a specific mandate on IDPs as an interim measure, but it was limited to the assistance and resettlement of PEV IDPs only.

Thereafter, it was realized that there was a need to develop a national policy framework for IDPs, and in 2009, Kenya began work to create a National IDP Policy. Members of the Protection Working Group on Internal Displacement (PWGID), a nationally-owned offshoot of the protection cluster that includes government, UN agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and KNCHR, set up a sub-working group to examine the gaps in IDP law and to draft key provisions of an IDP policy. By 2010, the IDP policy was finalized in collaboration with the MoSPP. It expanded the national definition of IDPs to include not just those people who fled PEV in 2007/2008 but recognized earlier and later displacements as well. It also included in its provisions protection for all displaced persons rather than just those displaced by political violence. However, despite all of the work to bring about its finalization, at the time of this study the National IDP Policy has not been fully approved by the Cabinet and remains to this day in draft form.42

Following completion of the draft policy in 2010, the Kenyan Parliament set up a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on the Resettlement of IDPs to look into the plight of displaced populations. The PSC was charged with drafting an IDP bill among other important tasks related to IDP protection. As a result of the PSC’s work in association with a range of national and international stakeholders, an IDP bill was developed and adopted in 2012.43 The 2012 Prevention, Protection, and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons and Affected Communities Act aligned with the UN Guiding Principles and with Kenya’s regional obligations under the Pact on Security, Stability, and Development in the Great Lakes Region.44

The Act calls for the establishment of a National Consultative and Coordination Committee (NCCC) to oversee its implementation. However, it took quite some time for such a Committee to be established. As of February 2015, the NCCC was not constituted, and was still in the phase of

41 Martina Caterina and Johanna Klos, “3 key trends that lie beneath the silent displacement crisis in Kenya’s north-east,” IDMC Blog Post, 21 May 2015, http://goo.gl/oGGl5o

42 Republic of Kenya, The National Policy Framework on the Prevention of Internal Displacement, Protection and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Kenya, Ministry of State for Special Programmes (MoSSP), 2012.

43 Republic of Kenya, Kenya: Act No. 56 of 2012, The Prevention, Protection and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons and Affected Communities Act, 2012, Kenya Gazette, 4 January 2013, accessed on RefWorld 2 June 2015, http://goo.gl/hA4v1d

44 The Pact was signed by the 12 member states of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR) in 2006. The Protocol to the Pact specifically addressing protection and assistance of IDPs obligates signature states to “enact legislation to domesticate the (UN) Guiding Principles fully and to provide a legal framework for their implementation within national systems.” See ICGLR, Protocol on the Protection and Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons, 30 November 2006, as found on RefWorld, accessed 2 June 2015, http://www.refworld.org/pdfid/52384fe44.pdf


conducting preparatory work. Members of the NCCC include line ministries and other stakeholders such as KNHRC and UNHCR. One of the challenges for the NCCC is that it does not possess adequate funding to conduct implementation monitoring.45

Since the time of the Act’s adoption in 2012, the issue of internal displacement has taken a back seat in Kenya. As noted above, the government initiated Operation Rudi Nyumbani in 2013 to facilitate the return of IDPs and the closure of camps. As a result, it no longer readily acknowledges that there are still IDPs in the country. At the same time, most parliamentarians in Kenya do not feel that it is necessary to adopt an IDP Policy given that the IDP Act is in place. Furthermore, it should be noted that Kenya has not yet ratified the Kampala Convention. Its eventual ratification of the regional treaty is complicated by the fact that once ratified the country would be obliged to domesticate the convention. A final note relating to government responsibilities for IDP protection in Kenya is that with the 2014 general elections in the country, the MoSSP was dissolved, and responsibility for all matters relating to internal displacement shifted to the Ministry of Devolution and Planning.46

UNHCR’S ROLE IN RELATION TO INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTIn addition to its traditional role in assisting refugees in Kenya, UNHCR launched intensive activities for IDP protection immediately following the 2007/2008 election violence. The protection cluster was activated (January 2008) following the elections and UNHCR conducted protection activities under the auspices of its IDP Pillar (2010). In 2009, participants of the protection cluster agreed to transition to a national forum – the Protection Working Group on Internal Displacement (PWGID). The Ministry of Justice and KNCHR assumed the roles of co-chairs and UNHCR retained its secretarial functions for this Working Group. It was under the auspices of the PWGID that UNHCR, together with other actors, provided significant support for the drafting of both the IDP Policy and the IDP Act in Kenya.47 Since end 2013, however, UNHCR has ceased its activities related to IDPs. The current focus of the UNHCR office is on the care of some 500,000 refugees, from Somalia and, increasingly, from South Sudan.48

UNHCR’S SPECIFIC ENGAGEMENT WITH KNCHR

Whilst UNHCR no longer has a direct engagement with KNCHR, there was a strong partnership between the two institutions immediately following the PEV in 2007/2008 through 2013. During that period, the two organizations were active in the protection cluster and the PWGID, functioning as critical contributors to the development of national law and policy. KNCHR had been involved in IDP issues since 2004, initially dealing with IDPs from the politically instigated violence of 1992 and 1997. It then expanded its role for IDPs in 2009, with the support of UNHCR, by establishing an IDP focal point and putting into place a mechanism for the monitoring and documentation of IDP human rights and protection concerns.49

45 Key informant interview, June 2015.46 Operational aspects related to disaster management still fall under the Ministry of Interior. Key informant interview, May

2015.47 See link to IDP Monitoring Project for further information on the PWGID, http://goo.gl/PyS62P48 UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR country operations profile – Kenya, as accessed on 2 June 2015,

http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e483a16.html49 UNHCR funded this position until 2013. Key informant interview, May 2015.


This mechanism was established to strengthen the work of the PWGID and came to be known as the IDP Monitoring Project. In 2011, UNHCR and KNCHR jointly led a monitoring mission that comprised IDP protection training and the deployment of 25 field monitors for a period of nine months. These two institutions also co-organized and co-facilitated workshops on IDP rights for PWGID members.50 The report produced through the joint IDP Monitoring Project was significant as it was the first IDP protection document of its kind in Kenya. Through the interviewing of over 4,000 households, the project was able to document the protection concerns of IDPs in a way that had never been done before.51

Figure 4: IDP Monitoring Project website banner

Source: KNCHR and UNHCR, IDP Monitoring Project website at http://www.knchr-idp.org

Following the elections of 2013, however, the plight of IDPs fell from national attention. The government declared that there were no longer any IDPs even though there were many unresolved IDP issues. Around the same time, UNHCR ended its activities on behalf of IDPs as it no longer had a budget for an IDP pillar (from 2014).

In light of these developments, KNCHR’s ability to monitor the conditions of IDPs and to advocate for their rights vis-à-vis the government has diminished considerably. KNCHR’s partnership with UNHCR had a big impact on its influence with parliamentarians, something that it has had difficulty maintaining without the financial and technical support of UNHCR. Certainly, KNCHR continues to be a reference point for IDP information but with less influence than before. KNCHR has four regional offices (the North Rift regional office, the Northern Kenya regional office, the Coastal regional office, and the Kisumu regional office) and covers IDPs as one of several “special groups” included under its mandate. KNCHR has undertaken investigations and fact-finding missions in cases of forced evictions and new displacements but at a much smaller scale than in the past. It released a report, in collaboration with IDMC, in 2012 entitled Unfinished Business: Kenya’s Efforts to Address Displacement and Land Issues in the Coast Region.52 The report highlights the lack of progress on implementation of the IDP Act as well as a lack of awareness about the law among responsible authorities both at national and sub-national levels. Current funders of KNCHR are the Government of Kenya, Germany, Norway, and UNDP.53

50 For instance, the KNCHR and UNHCR facilitated a joint workshop in 2011 with the Parliamentary Committee on Resettlement with the participation of the Special Rapporteur on the Protection of IDPs, resulting in several recommendations about how the MoSSP could improve its functions on behalf of IDPs. See: www.knchr-idp.org

51 See: www.knchr-idp.org52 Martina Caterina and Johanna Klos, Unfinished Business: Kenya’s efforts to address displacement and land issues in Coast

Region, IDMC, NRC, and KNCHR, July 2014, http://goo.gl/diYF9i53 Key informant interview, June 2015.


UNHCR Engagement with National Human Rights Institutions for IDP Protection30

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LESSONS FROM THE ENGAGEMENTThe partnership of UNHCR and KNCHR demonstrates how UNHCR’s collaboration with an NHRI can encourage a government to develop a comprehensive legal framework to address IDP issues when it has no existing systems in place. KNCHR staff notes that the success of its partnership with UNHCR was not simply due to the financial support it received, but also to UNHCR’s international reputation and its concomitant ability to bring parliamentarians and relevant ministry representatives attention to IDP issues. UNHCR’s decision to end its IDP protection activities in 2013 as a result of funding constraints is unfortunate as it was precisely at this time that Kenya and KNCHR required assistance in the implementation of the IDP Act. The timing of UNHCR’s exit was also inopportune as it was around the same time that the Kenyan government announced that there were no more IDPs in the country. UNHCR’s subsequent phasing-out of its IDP Pillar in Kenya would seem to have sent the wrong political message to the Kenyan government and to national human rights advocates.

The main lessons learnt from Kenya are:

• The joint monitoring of IDP protection has become a common component of UNHCR’s engagement with NHRIs. Joint monitoring raises the profile of IDPs, increases access, and allows for the production of early warning reports and other advocacy material not otherwise made available to stakeholders. IDP monitoring by NHRI field staff with UNHCR’s training and financial support is a critical area of IDP protection that should be duplicated in other countries.

• Of particular note in Kenya is that the protection cluster was nationalized through the creation of the Protection Working Group on IDPs (PWGID). The establishment of the PWGID, co-led by KNCHR and the Ministry of Justice, with UNHCR as secretariat was a useful strategy for IDP protection.

• As in other countries, UNHCR’s funding of an IDP focal point or unit within the NHRI is an effective tool in promoting greater institutional and national attention for IDP protection.

• Probably the most important lesson from Kenya is that UNHCR requires a systematic and explicit exit strategy when ending IDP protection activities, particularly as relates to its engagement with NHRIs. In the case of Kenya, KNCHR was not aware that UNHCR would be pulling its funding and was unable to prepare a strategy of its own to continue IDP monitoring and protection activities at the level that was pursued jointly with UNHCR on its own. Therefore, it has been left in a difficult position just at the time that IDP protection activities are greatly required.


OVERVIEW OF DISPLACEMENTViolent clashes between government forces and armed groups in the northeast of Nigeria have caused nearly 15,000 deaths and the displacement of over 1.5 million people since 2009.54 In recent years, violence in the country has escalated dramatically as a result of the counter-insurgency against Boko Haram, but also as a result of ever-rising inter-communal fighting. The majority of IDPs are living in the northeast states of Adamawa, Bauchi, Gombe, Taraba, Yobe, and Borno although access to many of these people, particularly in Borno state, is heavily constrained by insecurity.55 Most IDPs live with host communities, and only an estimated 15 percent live in displacement sites, either government-run or informal. IDPs face a range of protection issues, including rape, abduction, forced marriage, and forced recruitment, among other human rights violations.

NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS/INSTITUTIONS FOR INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTWhilst the central emphasis of the Nigerian government is on its military and security response to the insurgency, it has nonetheless taken some steps to address the massive displacement that has occurred in the country as a result of the conflict. Prior to the current crisis, Nigeria

54 Boko Haram seeks to create an Islamic state in Nigeria and has recently pledged its allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

55 IDMC, Boko Haram’s terror ripples through the region, April 2015, http://goo.gl/5DcPjm

NigeriaNIGERIA NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION (NHRC)


Structure: Multi-member commission

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN NIGERIA

Number of IDPs in country: 1.5 million*



• Increasingly violent conflict since 2009;

• National IDP policy drafted but not yet adopted; Kampala Convention ratified in 2012, but yet to be domesticated;

• Large-scale monitoring project launched by UNHCR and Nigerian NHRC in March 2015.

* IDMC, Figures Analysis, April 2015, http://goo.gl/IPfF7H

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had no legislation dealing explicitly with IDPs, and there was no government entity charged with the registration and protection of IDPs.56

A first step for Nigeria in addressing the protection and assistance concerns of the growing number of IDPs in the country was a review of the existing draft IDP National Policy. The government established a committee to draft the policy back in 200357, but it was not until the sharp rise in IDP numbers over the last couple of years that work to finalize the draft picked pace. As a result of these more recent efforts, a policy draft was finalized and presented to government in 2011. UNHCR provided ample support to the drafting process, working in close collaboration with the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and IDPs (NCFRMI), a government entity housed within the Vice-President’s office that was spearheading the completion of the draft. Currently, the draft is waiting official adoption by the Federal Executive Council.58

Without accompanying IDP legislation in Nigeria, the National IDP Policy aims to guide different government and international actors in the protection and assistance of IDPs. It dictates that the President will nominate a focal coordinating institution to provide overall leadership on IDP issues. This institution is not named in the policy, but may be the existing NCFRMI, noted above, in partnership with the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), the Institute of Peace and Conflict Resolution, and the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).59 Further to the IDP policy, Nigeria has signed and ratified (2012) the Kampala Convention. It is hoped that it will soon domesticate its obligations under this regional treaty through a national IDP law.

UNHCR’S ROLE IN RELATION TO INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTGiven the acute violence in the country, UNHCR is intensively focused on its protection and assistance role in Nigeria, responding to the needs of hundreds of thousands of IDPs and several thousand recognized refugees. In terms of its IDP protection role, UNHCR has strengthened its presence in the country to monitor conditions of IDPs in concert with NHCR. It has also assisted the government in building its capacity to respond to the massive displacement through basic training on principles of protection and camp coordination and camp management.60

As the cluster approach has not been activated in the country, international agencies and the national government have operated according to a sector response since 2012 as specified in the National Contingency Plan. The protection sector working group is co-led by UNHCR and NHRC while Camp coordination and camp management sector is co-led by IOM and NEMA. In terms of humanitarian operations, UNHCR coordinates with the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and its sub-national units, State Emergency Management Agencies (SEMAs), established in all of the country’s 36 states of the country as well as with the Nigerian Red Cross Society.61

56 Currently, all IDP registration is handled by entities outside of government, namely the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Nigerian National Red Cross Society, key informant interview, May 2015.

57 Bagoni Alhaji Bukar, “Nigeria needs to take responsibility for its IDPs,” Forced Migration Review, August 2012, pp. 44-45.58 Key informant interview, May 2015.59 Government of Nigeria, National Disaster Framework, 2010, as found on PreventionWeb at http://goo.gl/FDlnnC and key

informant interview, May 2015.60 UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR subregional operations profile – West Africa, accessed 3 June 2015,

http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e484f76.html61 Key informant interview, May 2015.


UNHCR’S SPECIFIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THE NIGERIAN NHRCThe NHRC in Nigeria was established in 1995. The Commission is a rather large structure with an extensive presence outside of the capital. The NHRC’s six zonal offices are as follows: North West Zone (Kano); North East Zone (Maiduguri); North Central (Jos); South West (Lagos); South East (Enugu) and South South (Port Harcourt). The NHRC had been collaborating with OHCHR and UNDP prior to its partnership with UNHCR. It now also works with UNICEF on child protection issues. With the support of OHCHR, the Commission was able to deploy 30 human rights observers to monitor the general protection conditions of civilians in 2014 (in Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe). In addition to the project funds that it receives from UN agencies, NHRC is also currently funded by the Open Society Initiative, the Ford Foundation, the British Council as well as Mexico, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and the European Union (EU).62

UNHCR’s primary engagement with the NHRC started when the two organizations signed a Partnership Agreement in March 2015. The Partnership Agreement calls for the training and hiring of over 300 human rights monitors and well as the design and establishment of a country-wide protection monitoring database. Monitors for the project will conduct field monitoring for IDP protection and return until at least December 2015. Monitors are currently active in ten states, four of which are in the Middle Belt and six in the Northeast. Thus far, the monitoring mission has been very useful in alerting government entities and humanitarian organizations to protection concerns and to gaps in assistance.

62 Key informant interview, May 2015.

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LESSONS FROM THE ENGAGEMENTUNHCR’s engagement with the Nigerian NHRC is relatively new and takes place in the context of a very volatile security situation. It shows that collaboration with NHRIs need not only take place during post-conflict periods but can also be initiated to gain access to vulnerable populations during active conflict. The added value of the UNHCR/NHRC partnership is that it is well known and can now work with the newly elected government assembly to push forward the IDP protection agenda.

The main lessons learnt from Nigeria are:

• The current partnership between UNHCR and the Nigerian NHRC is the largest such mission that UNHCR has ever supported. It demonstrates that with financial assistance and technical support, NHRIs can become very operational in their approach to protection and can conduct IDP protection monitoring across large geographic areas, even during periods of acute conflict.

• Of particular note in the case of Nigeria is the expertise that now exists in the country for the design and establishment of a protection monitoring database for IDPs, including the creation of data sets and the development of real-time reporting processes. UNHCR and NHRC have established a complex system of reporting that allows for the compilation of nation-wide data but also for the follow-up of reported violations at state levels. Other UNHCR offices should be encouraged to tap into the technical expertise surrounding the creation of an IDP protection monitoring database that exists in Nigeria in developing their own real-time monitoring frameworks.

• Given the volatile situation in Nigeria, the partnership with the NHRC has enabled UNHCR to have access to insecure parts of the country that it might not otherwise be able to access. Overall, it can be said that joint monitoring with NHRIs can facilitate enhanced access to vulnerable IDPs in difficult security situations.

• When a country finds itself in a state of acute insecurity, it can be hard for the government to focus its attention on issues beyond military and security response. The UNHCR/NHRC partnership in Nigeria has been effective in garnering the attention of government in a way that may not have been possible if the two organizations had tried to work on these issues alone.


OVERVIEW OF DISPLACEMENTMillions of people in the Philippines are displaced on an annual basis, primarily as a result of natural disasters such as typhoons and floods, but also as a result of protracted fighting between the Government of the Philippines and armed groups, including break-away factions of the armed forces of the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in the southern region of Mindanao.63 Further to the protracted conflict in southern Philippines, the country was hit with the deadliest typhoon in its history – Typhoon Haiyan – in November 2013. As a result of the massive storm, over 6,000 people died and some four million persons were displaced.

Displacement figures in the Philippines fluctuate greatly as a result of continuous barrage natural disasters in the island nation. The bulk of displacement is said to be temporary and localized with people generally returning home as soon as they can. However, many IDPs, particularly those displaced by conflict, are unable to return home, leaving them in a state of prolonged displacement, living either with host families or in government transit sites. By 2015, it was estimated that there were 736,500 people displaced in the country, the lowest reported figure of IDPs in the

63 “Muslim insurgent groups have been fighting the government in Mindanao for more than a century. In 1976 the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the government signed the Tripoli Agreement, which established a degree of autonomy for 13 provinces and nine cities in the southern Philippines. After only limited success in implementing it amid continuing conflict, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) was formally established in 1990. Six years later, MNLF entered into a final peace deal with the government, leaving the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) as the country’s main Muslim insurgency group.” From IDMC, Philippines: long-term recovery challenges remain in wake of massive displacement, 10 February 2015, http://goo.gl/dQUEZL

PhilippinesCOMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS (CHR) OF THE PHILIPPINES


Structure: Chairperson and four members appointed by the president; As of 2102, CHR had some 540 staff, 250 of which were in Manila and another 290 that were in regional offices.*

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN THE PHILIPPINES

Number of IDPs in country: 736,500

Protection cluster activation: Yes, nationalized since 2007


• Mixed caseload of disaster and conflict-induced IDPs in the country;

• Two separate but associated CHRs, one at the national level and one at the regional level (ARMM);

• UNHCR office believes its value added is primarily for the protection of conflict-induced IDPs rather than natural-disaster IDPs.

* CHR of the Philippines. 2012 Annual Report, prepared by the Strategic Development and Planning Office, 2013, http://goo.gl/gPF6C5

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Philippines since 2011. Eighty percent of these people were disaster-induced IDPs whilst a further 95,000 were reportedly displaced by the conflict and violence in Mindanao.64

NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS/INSTITUTIONS FOR INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTGiven the recurrent internal displacement in the Philippines, the government has created a number of structures and procedures for addressing the protection and assistance needs of IDPs. One such mechanism is the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC). The NDRRMC is the country’s main disaster coordinating body. It is a national offshoot of the cluster system, formally institutionalized into government in 2007. It includes the participation of a range of stakeholders, permitting close coordination between government officials and the international humanitarian community.65 Further to the NDRRMC, there is the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), one of the country’s nine ministries, that is charged with overall responsibility for disaster response and assistance to vulnerable populations. The DSWD leads the protection cluster with UNHCR as co-lead.66

In the context of these institutional structures, there were no specific national laws or policies on IDPs for some time, and the government ministries charged with IDP affairs apparently knew little about the rights of IDPs. Therefore, it was necessary to put together a national IDP law. Drafting began with the support of UNHCR as of 2004. A bill was approved by the House of Representatives in August 2014.67 In order to be signed into law, the bill now needs approval by the Senate. Such approval is expected during the course of 2015. Of particular note is that the bill designates the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) as the national institutional focal point for IDPs.68

UNHCR’S ROLE IN RELATION TO INTERNAL DISPLACEMENTThe central aspect of UNHCR’s work in the Philippines has been to promote and monitor the 1951 Refugee Convention. UNHCR provided protection for refugees (mostly urban) and asylum seekers in the early days of its operations. As the conflict in Mindanao deteriorated, however, UNHCR became increasingly involved in conflict-induced IDP protection issues as well. Then, when Typhoon Haiyan struck in 2013, the UN Emergency Response Coordinator asked UNHCR to assume protection responsibilities for disaster-affected IDPs.

Further to its operational role, UNHCR worked with members of Congress for years to support the drafting of the national IDP Law currently up for adoption.69 UNHCR also played an important role in the establishment of a regional CHR in Mindanao (to be discussed below).

64 IDMC, Philippines: long-term recovery challenges remain in wake of massive displacement, 10 February 2015, http://goo.gl/dQUEZL

65 For a full list of NDRRMC government member agencies, see http://goo.gl/6O5qYM66 In terms of data collection, IDP figures for those people uprooted by natural disasters are collected by the NDRRMC. Figures

for conflict-related IDPs are collected by the Mindanao Protection Cluster (MPC), key informant interview, May 2015.67 A previous draft IDP bill had been vetoed by the president in 2013. Key informant interview, May 2015.68 Sixteenth Congress of the Republic of the Philippines. An Act Protecting the Rights of Internally Displaced Persons and

Penalizing the Acts of Arbitrary Internal Displacement, 14 August 2014, http://www.senate.gov.ph/lisdata/1967616801!.pdf69 Key informant interview, May 2015.


UNHCR’S SPECIFIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THE PHILIPPINES CHRThere are two national human rights commissions in the Philippines, the national CHR and the CHR-ARMM Regional Office based in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). UNHCR began engagement with the national CHR in 2009 and signed a partnership agreement with the national institution in 2011. At the time, UNHCR was already co-leading the protection cluster, together with DSWD, and invited the CHR to participate. Among the various activities around which UNHCR and the national CHR currently collaborate are protection monitoring, the development of IDP protection standards, training, and advocacy for IDP rights with government ministries and congress. UNHCR also funds a dedicated IDP unit within the national CHR which includes one coordinator, one policy officer, and occasional costs for some of CHR’s regional officers.

The attempts trials by UNHCR to move the national CHR towards a more operational approach to IDP monitoring and reporting have not always been successful. The presence of CHR regional offices in the provinces is currently very light with only one or two lawyers stationed in 15 regions of the country. Moreover, the national institution retains a traditionally complaints-driven approach to its human rights protection work and has not been able to take on a more operational role.70

The CHR-ARMM Regional Office, established in 2012, has functioned in a more proactive manner. The formation of the regional office was the national CHR’s institutional response to the severe

70 Key informant interview, May 2015.

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human rights challenges in the area.71 Unlike its national counterpart, the CHR-ARMM Regional Office is more operational and anticipatory, in part perhaps because it was initially managed by an active human rights lawyer who understood the human rights-related root causes of displacement. UNHCR played an important role in the establishment of the CHR-ARMM Regional Office, working for almost a year to promote its set up and providing it with funding and equipment.72 With the prevalent displacement in Mindanao, the CHR-ARMM Regional Office has collaborated closely with UNHCR to strengthen IDP monitoring, protection, and the development of law and policy.73

LESSONS FROM THE ENGAGEMENTUNHCR’s engagement with the two CHRs in the Philippines illustrates the importance of long-term advocacy efforts in building the capacities of NHRIs and in encouraging these institutions to become more operational in their approach. When the national office was slower to adapt, UNHCR worked to support the creation of a regional office in Mindanao. The CHR-ARMM Regional office was a good example of how the decentralization of IDP monitoring can be useful in instances where a particular region of the country merits more intensive IDP protection work than others. That being said, with a decentralized approach, UNHCR must be vigilant in the monitoring and support of subnational NHRI offices to ensure that results are achieved in a timely manner.

The main lessons learnt from the Philippines are:

• Partnership with NHRIs can give UNHCR privileged access to key government decision-makers, facilitating a stronger enabling environment for IDP protection. In the case of the Philippines, UNHCR’s partnership with the CHR, for instance, allowed it a level of access to the Department of Justice that it would not otherwise have had. Together, UNHCR and CHR have been able to broker several meetings with the Department of Justice.

• As in Colombia, there are an increasing number of UN agencies seeking to engage with the CHR. UNHCR is currently working with the Humanitarian Country Team (HCT) to develop rules of engagement and to possibly constitute within the UN team a “Friends of the HR Commission.” More work is required by UNHCR and its UN partners to work jointly towards shared objectives that can leverage their complementary roles in ensuring sustainable relations with NHRIs.

• UNHCR’s engagement with the CHR and its engagement in IDP protection issues and the Cluster system enabled a clearer understanding of other government agencies and clusters of protection principals and their application.

• UNHCR’s support for the establishment of a decentralized CHR-ARMM Regional Office has been an important step in improving the IDP protection environment in the Philippines. The establishment of capable and well-resourced regional NHRI offices may be an approach that UNHCR wishes to duplicate in other countries where the national NHRI is not highly operational.

71 CHR of the Philippines. 2012 Annual Report, Prepared by the Strategic Development and Planning Office, 2013, http://goo.gl/0DxEWF

72 Today, there are multiple funders of the CHR-ARMM Regional Officer, key informant interview, May 2015.73 CHR of the Philippines. 2012 Annual Report, Prepared by the Strategic Development and Planning Office, 2013,

http://goo.gl/0DxEWF


SUMMARY OF KEY LESSONS LEARNT BY PHASE OF ENGAGEMENT WITH NHRI (as taken from the case studies)

Phase of engagement Lesson learnt

1. Determining the appropriateness of UNHCR engagement with NHRI

NHRIs need not be the focus of engagement if UNHCR actions for IDP protection are better concentrated on multi-institutional government processes (Afghanistan and Colombia).

UNHCR cannot substitute indefinitely if an NHRI does not take ownership of IDP protection issues (Afghanistan).

The effectiveness of UNHCR engagement with NHRIs is made more difficult when there is an intensification of fighting and a surge in emergency operations (Afghanistan).

2. Defining the terms of UNHCR engagement with NHRIs

Understanding the personality and politics of the particular individual who holds the Ombudsman position has been a key consideration in UNHCR’s strategy for NHRI engagement (Colombia).

3. Determining the scope and breadth of UNHCR engagement with NHRI

The establishment of a nationalized Protection Working Group with the participation of UNHCR and the NHRI is a useful strategy for IDP protection (Kenya).

Partnerships with NHRIs can give UNHCR privileged access to key government decision-makers, facilitating a stronger enabling environment for IDP protection (Philippines).

The design and establishment of a protection monitoring database for IDPs, including the creation of data sets and the development of real-time reporting processes, can support rapid response to IDP protection issues (Nigeria).

Joint monitoring raises the profile of IDPs, increases access, and allows for the production of early warning reports and other advocacy material not otherwise made available to stakeholders (Nigeria, Kenya, Afghanistan).

The UNHCR/NHRC partnership can be effective in garnering the attention of government in a way that may not be possible if the two organizations work alone (Nigeria).

The establishment of capable and well-resourced regional NHRI offices may be an approach that UNHCR wishes to duplicate in other countries where the national NHRI is not highly operational (Philippines)

4. Sustaining a long-term engagement with NHRIs with a clear exit strategy

The continuous, long-term support to the NHRI by UNHCR has allowed it to develop real capacities for IDP monitoring and reporting (Colombia).

With financial assistance and technical support, NHRIs can become very operational in their approach to protection and can conduct IDP protection monitoring across large geographic areas (Nigeria).

UNHCR’s medium to long-term funding of an IDP focal point or unit within the NHRI is an effective tool in promoting greater institutional and national attention for IDP protection (Nigeria, Kenya, Afghanistan, Philippines, Colombia).

UNHCR requires a systematic and explicit exit strategy when ending IDP protection activities due to budgeting constraints, particularly as relates to its engagement with NHRIs (Kenya, Afghanistan).

More work is required by UNHCR and its UN partners to work jointly towards shared objectives that can leverage their complementary roles in ensuring sustainable relations with NHRIs; (Colombia, Philippines).


SUMMARY OF TYPES OF ENGAGEMENT WITH NHRIS BY CASE STUDY

Country

UNHCR involvement in law & policy development

UNHCR-supported IDP focal point/unit within NHRI

Joint protection monitoring activities

Co-leadrship of the protection cluster or protection working group

Joint advocacy programme

Afghanistan * – * * (with MORR, AIHRC participates)

*

Colombia * * * – *

Kenya * * * * (KNCHR and UNHCR both participated in protection cluster when it existed, the Protection Working Group on Internal Displacement (PWGID), and now the National Consultative and Coordination Committee (NCCC)

*

Nigeria * – * * (UNHCR and NHRC co-lead the sector working group on protection)

*

Philippines * * * * (with DSWD, CHR participates)

*


4 . CONCLUSIONS

The country case studies examined here demonstrate that UNHCR engagement with NHRIs can be a useful and innovative strategy for enhancing the protection of IDPs. Building the capacities and skill sets of NHRIs in the area of IDP protection raises the profile of these vulnerable populations vis-à-vis government and non-government actors, encourages governments to develop legislative and policy frameworks for IDPs, and allows for the collection of useful early warning data about the protection and assistance needs of IDPs for immediate response by a range of humanitarian stakeholders. Findings from this study are fairly straight-forward – NHRIs simply become stronger human rights advocates for IDPs through their partnership with UNHCR.

In particular, it can be said that UNHCR and NHRIs are better together than they are separately when it comes to IDP protection. UNHCR’s partnership with NHRIs is not just about resourcing these national institutions to build their capacities but about the prestige and combined leverage that the two institutions can use to advocate with governments for the benefit of IDPs when they work together. NHRIs can provide enhanced access to government ministries through their position; UNHCR can facilitate this access through its financial support, protection expertise and reputation. NHRIs can offer greater access to vulnerable populations for the purposes of monitoring; UNHCR can support this monitoring through training and the development of data management systems that organize the massive volumes of information collected. Finally, engagement with NHRIs allows UNHCR and other humanitarian actors with a protection focus to have access to a partner and a State mechanism through which humanitarian protection and human rights approaches can be discussed and integrated.

Where UNHCR engagement with NHRIs has not yet produced serious results is in the areas of prevention and durable solutions. As noted in the case of Afghanistan, when fighting intensifies and new displacements are occurring, it can be difficult for UNHCR to maintain a regular liaison with the NHRI due to the fact that UNHCR is focused on the delivery of emergency humanitarian assistance and on its primary operational leadership responsibilities through the cluster system. In these instances, the NHRI can also have diminished influence. Whilst the presence and support of UNHCR to NHRIs and to legislative and ministerial branches of government, has been key to the development of laws and policies for IDPs, less consistent work has been done to oversee the actual on-the-ground implementation of these laws and policies, something that would be very useful to IDPs in a number of the countries profiled here.

The case studies also illustrate that more work could be done with NHRIs in terms of promoting durable solutions for IDPs. In only a few cases have durable solutions seriously been on the agenda of UNHCR/NHRI partnerships. A positive example, however, comes from the Philippines where local authorities were blocking the return of IDPs and the rehabilitation of homes in Zamboanga.


In response, UNHCR and the CHR developed a housing policy code with city authorities. The code comprises a complaints mechanism for persons struggling to receive permanent housing. The involvement of UNHCR in permanent housing issues, although not common, has been very useful in this situation in facilitating durable solutions for these IDPs.

The whole question of using the NHRI partnership to facilitate durable solutions for IDPs is an interesting one for UNHCR in that it actually exposes some important weaknesses with regard to UNHCR’s engagement on behalf of IDPs more generally. For instance, it is clear that the utilization of these human rights institutions for humanitarian protection works well and is highly appreciated by national stakeholders. However, once the humanitarian crisis comes to a close but internal displacement continues, there is often a major gap in protection and solutions that can still benefit from an engagement by NHRIs. Does UNHCR continue its engagement? And, if not, who can step in? The case studies examined here show that, thus far, none of the international actors that are closely collaborating with NHRIs have been involved in any consistent manner in the search for solutions in protracted situations of internal displacement.

An outstanding concern regarding UNHCR’s engagement with NHRIs is that while the partnership may enhance IDP protection, it may be viewed by governments and international partners to mean that UNHCR is taking on a longer-term human rights role that goes beyond its protection mandate. Given that UNHCR is not in the position to remain engaged with IDPs indefinitely, UNHCR would do well to express to partners that its engagement with NHRIs is to enhance the agency’s performance in fulfilling its IDP mandate, rather than to seek a fuller engagement in general human rights issues. A clearer articulation of UNHCR’s intended role at both the beginning and end of their involvement in internal displacement situations would be useful in developing a more widely understood UNHCR “exit strategy” with regard to IDP protection. It would also help to ensure that the NHRI influence developed during its partnership with UNHCR is not diminished once UNHCR exits.

KEY LESSONS LEARNTCountry-specific lessons have already been noted in the case study descriptions above. These lessons would seem to support a handful of more general lessons learnt for UNHCR moving forward. These lessons learnt are noted below:

1. NHRI ENGAGEMENT IN IDP PROTECTION IS NOT AUTOMATIC IN ALL SITUATIONS OF INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT AND THUS REQUIRES MORE DELIBERATE OUTREACH AND ADVOCACY ON THE PART OF UNHCR. Over time, for engagement to be sustainable and meaningful, an NHRI must exhibit certain performance characteristics and ownership of IDP issues, regardless of its ICC A status. Certainly, a central function of UNHCR is to support the capacity building of NHRIs, but if after some time, the institution is not demonstrating a greater commitment to IDP protection, UNHCR may consider disengaging, as it cannot substitute for the national institution indefinitely. This of course would need to be built into UNHCR’s exit strategy, as explained more below.


2. IN SITUATIONS WHERE UNHCR HAS DETERMINED THAT A PARTNERSHIP WITH THE NHRI CAN FACILITATE IDP PROTECTION, IT MAY CONSIDER INNOVATIVE WAYS IN WHICH TO MAKE A LONGER-TERM COMMITMENT AND/OR MULTI-YEAR PLANNING/STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT TO THIS ENGAGEMENT. IDP protection through partnerships with NHRIs must go beyond 12-month actions. Although these actions can be renewed annually, it would be useful to plan from the outset for a multi-year strategy. Some of the greatest achievements of UNHCR with NHRIs have been the result of years of support. The consistent and long-term engagements of UNHCR with NHRIs in Colombia and the Philippines are reflective of the successes UNHCR can have when it remains steadfast in its partnerships with NHRIs. The recently signed partnership with the NHRC in Nigeria for the large-scale monitoring operation in the country is another example of an initiative that requires more than a 12-month time frame. Offering a multi-year commitment would also help NHRIs to develop their own multi-year strategic planning.

3. IN INSTANCES WHERE UNHCR LAUNCHES A PARTNERSHIP WITH NHRIs, IT WOULD DO WELL TO IDENTIFY ALL OTHER NATIONAL INSTITUTIONS THAT CAN FURTHER ENHANCE THIS ENGAGEMENT THROUGH A FULLY MULTI-INSTITUTIONAL APPROACH. In a number of the case studies, it is clear that UNHCR’s collaboration with relevant government ministries, judicial bodies, control organs, and nationalized coordination mechanisms has been equally important to its achievements for IDP protection as the close collaboration with the NHRI. In Colombia, UNHCR works with a number of government and quasi-government entities, most notably the Constitutional Court. In Afghanistan, UNHCR has worked closely with the IDP Policy Working Group and in Kenya with the Protection Working Group on IDPs (PWGID). In these instances, UNHCR’s multi-institutional collaboration includes the NHRIs, ensuring that all actors are working together for IDP protection.

4. GIVEN THE RISING NUMBER OF UN AGENCIES SEEKING TO ENGAGE WITH NHRIs, UNHCR SHOULD COORDINATE ITS APPROACH TO NHRIS WITH OTHER UN AGENCIES. A number of interviewees mentioned that the transactional costs for NHRIs are rising with an ever-increasing number of UN agencies wishing to engage with them, and that their attention is being divided by a multitude of human rights agendas. In order to promote the sustainable development of NHRIs as effective national human rights advocates, UNHCR should raise the issue of practical coordination and rules of engagement with UN country and humanitarian country teams.

5. UNHCR WOULD DO WELL TO REVIEW THE EFFICACY OF ITS PARTNERSHIPS WITH NHRIs IN THE CONTEXT OF DISPLACEMENT PREVENTION. As noted above, despite UNHCR’s efforts to increase monitoring of displacement in collaboration with NHRIs, this engagement has only had a minimal influence in preventing displacement. During periods of intensified violence and a subsequent rise in displacement, UNHCR is often too preoccupied with the delivery of emergency assistance and with its leadership functions under the cluster approach to commit consistent time to an NHRI engagement. At the same time, it is unclear that early warning systems can actually prevent displacement after all. For these reasons, UNHCR may wish to study options for its partnerships with NHRIs during this phase of the disaster cycle.


6. IN PREPARATION FOR RESPONSIBLE DISENGAGEMENT, UNHCR SHOULD ARTICULATE THE PURPOSE OF ITS PARTNERSHIP WITH NHRIs FROM THE OUTSET AND ENCOURAGE JOINT PROJECTS WITH DEVELOPMENT PARTNERS PRIOR TO ITS EXIT. It is important that both human rights organizations and development partners are aware that UNHCR has a core humanitarian mandate and will not be able to continue an intensive engagement with NHRIs past the humanitarian phase of operations. It should also, therefore, seek partnerships with those agencies that will be more closely involved in activities for durable solutions in order that there is a smooth transfer of responsibilities.

7. WHILST UNHCR’S FINANCIAL SUPPORT TO NHRIs HAS BEEN CRITICAL IN BUILDING THEIR CAPACITIES TO ADVOCATE FOR IDPS, UNHCR SHOULD BE CAREFUL THAT ITS EXTERNAL FUNDING DOES NOT JEOPARDIZE PERCEPTIONS OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF THESE NATIONAL INSTITUTIONS. Ultimately, it is the State’s responsibility to ensure a minimum activity budget for NHRIs. When NHRIs are funded by external sources, such as humanitarian and development partners, it may affect the way in which government and non-government civil society actors view the institution and its actions. In building up partnerships with NHRIs for IDP protection, UNHCR should be careful that these organizations remain autonomous and are not simply viewed as a UNHCR implementing partner.


ANNE

X: SU

MMAR

Y OF C

ASE S

TUDI

ES Background: UNHCR began a systematic engagement with the AIHRC in 2004/2005 when it initiated an intensive programme of joint human rights and IDP monitoring. This engagement was further strengthened in 2008 when there was a surge in internal displacement in the country.

Salient features of UNHCR’s engagement AIHRC:

• A coordinated system for collecting data on IDPs developed;

• Joint monitoring and advocacy reports were released;

• A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed in 2008;

• A series of trainings were conducted for human rights monitors;

• UNHCR provided capacity-building resources.

Details of UNHCR disengagement: Following a relatively active initial UNHCR engagement with the AIHRC, a number of factors ultimately made AIHC less of a key strategic partner for UNHCR. For one, the overall capacity and legitimacy of the AIHRC declined. In parallel, there was the establishment of potentially more effective multi-stakeholder processes, notably the IDP Task Forces and Policy Implementation Committees. Finally, with a tightening of the UNHCR country budget, UNHCR has had to concentrate more narrowly on its core refugee mandate in Afghanistan.

Lessons learnt:

1. UNHCR cannot substitute indefinitely if an NHRI does not take ultimately step up to take ownership of IDP protection issues;

2. NHRIs need not be the focus of engagement if UNHCR actions for IDP protection are better concentrated on multi-institutional government processes;

3. The effectiveness of UNHCR engagement with NHRIs can be made more difficult when there is an intensification of fighting and a surge in emergency operations.

AfghanistanAFGHANISTAN INDEPENDENT HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION (AIHRC)


Structure: 9 commissioners appointed by president; AIHRC has a total of 605 staff members*

ICC status: “A” since 2007


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN AFGHANISTAN

Number of IDPs in country: 850,000 up from 400,000 in 2012**

Protection cluster activation: Yes, since 2008


• Highly volatile political and security situation with increased violence against civilians;

• Complex situation with coexistence of new and protracted displacement;

• New systems being established by government to implement National IDP Policy.

* AIHRC, Annual Report 1389 (2010/2011), 2011, p. 19, found at http://goo.gl/w1GTbZ

** UNHCR, Summary background on conflict-induced IDPs in Afghanistan, 15 April 2015, p. 5.

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Background: Initiated nearly 20 years ago, UNHCR’s engagement with the Defensoria del Pueblo is the most continuous and long-standing of its engagements with NHRIs in the world. The bilateral relationship of UNHCR and the Ombudsman’s office is particularly important as neither the Ombudsman’s office nor any government ministries participate in the cluster system in Colombia.

Salient features of UNHCR’s engagement with the Defensoria del Pueblo:

• Encouragement to expand focus from traditional human rights violations only to include the protection of IDPs;

• Push to become a more operational agency with a multitude of field offices;

• Financial support for an IDP unit within the Defensoria del Pueblo;

• Continuous renewal of annual MOUs for bilateral partnership;

• Support for the production of early warning reports and contextual analyses.

Lessons learnt:

1. Long-term UNHCR support to the Ombudsman’s office has allowed the national institution to develop real capacities for IDP monitoring, reporting, and advocacy.

2. Instrumental to UNHCR’s role in promoting IDP protection in Colombia has been its multi-institutional approach.

3. Given the ever-increasing number of UN agencies working with the Ombudsman’s office, it would be useful to develop rules for engagement for the different agencies of the UN Country Team.

Background: Whilst UNHCR no longer has a direct engagement with KNCHR, there was a strong partnership between the two institutions immediately following the post-election violence (PEV) in 2007/2008 through 2013.

ColombiaDEFENSORIA DEL PUEBLO


Structure: Ombudsman appointed by president and elected by chamber of representatives; office has total of over 2,000 staff; for IDP affairs, there are 20 staff in Bogota and 100 staff in field offices.*

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN COLOMBIA

Number of IDPs in country: 6.3 million

Protection cluster activation: Yes, since 2006, but neither the Ombudsman’s office nor the government participates in the clusters.


• Highly legalized environment for IDP protection;

• Focus of international community is on institution-building and state support, not large-scale humanitarian assistance;

• UNHCR has long-standing collaborative relationship with the Defensoria del Pueblo.

* Beth Ferris, Changing Times: The International Response to Internal Displacement in Colombia, Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement, Brookings Institution, December 2014, http://goo.gl/rtVaAc

47

Salient features of UNHCR’s engagement KNCHR:

• Allowed for expansion of KNCHR’s role in IDP protection through technical and financial assistance, in particular the funding of an IDP focal point;

• Worked together with KNCHR under the auspices of the protection cluster and the Protection Working Group on Internal Displacement (PWGID);

• Functioned as critical contributors to the development of national law and policy;

• Put into place a mechanism for the monitoring and documentation of IDP human rights and protection concerns, known as the IDP Monitoring Project.

Lessons learnt:

1. Joint monitoring raises the profile of IDPs, increases access, and allows for the production of advocacy material not otherwise available to stakeholders.

2. The establishment of the PWGID, co-led by KNCHR and the Ministry of Justice, with UNHCR as secretariat was a useful strategy for IDP protection.

3. UNHCR requires a systematic and explicit exit strategy when ending IDP protection activities, particularly as relates to its engagement with NHRIs.

KenyaKENYA NATIONAL COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS (KNCHR)

Date of establishment: 2011, successor to body of same name established in 2002.*

Structure: A chairperson and four commissioners are stipulated in the KNCHR Act; today, there are only four commissioners in place. KNCHR has a total of 108 staff.**

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN KENYA

Number of IDPs in country: unknown; IDMC estimates 309,200 IDPs as of February 2015.



• Government places little emphasis on internal displacement even though there are many new IDPs in Kenya and thousands of 2007/2008 IDPs who have yet to find durable solutions;

• There has been some progress in developing national legislation for IDPs, but much remains to be done in terms of implementation;

• UNHCR no longer has a budget for reintegration and IDP projects (Pillars 3 & 4)*** and does not currently have a direct partnership with KNCHR.

* There was a new constitution adopted in Kenya in 2010. The current KNCHR was established pursuant to article 59 of that constitution. See http://goo.gl/YCBRIi

** KNCHR, 11th Annual Report, 2013/2014, 2014, http://goo.gl/YAlW9t

*** UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR subregional operational profiles – East and Horn of Africa, http://www.unhcr.org/pages/49e45a846.html

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NigeriaNIGERIA NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION (NHRC)


Structure: Multi-member commission

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN NIGERIA

Number of IDPs in country: 1.5 million*



• Increasingly violent conflict since 2009;

• National IDP policy drafted but not yet adopted; Kampala Convention ratified in 2012, but yet to be domesticated;

• Large-scale monitoring project launched by UNHCR and Nigerian NHRC in March 2015.

* IDMC, Figures Analysis, April 2015, http://goo.gl/IPfF7H

Background: In response to the massive displacement in Nigeria, UNHCR has strengthened its presence in the country to monitor protection conditions of IDPs in concert with the NHCR. UNHCR’s engagement with the Nigerian NHRC is relatively new and takes place in the context of a very volatile security situation.

Salient features of UNHCR’s engagement with Nigerian NHRC:

• Co-leads the protection sector working group with NHRC;

• Signed Partnership Agreement with NHRC in March 2015;

• Has provided technical and financial support for the training and hiring of over 300 human rights monitors;

• Has supported the design and establishment of a country-wide IDP protection monitoring database for real-time reporting on protection risks and violations.

Lessons learnt:

1. With financial assistance and technical support, NHRIs can become very operational in their approach to protection and can conduct IDP protection monitoring across large geographic areas, even during periods of acute conflict;

2. Of particular note in the case of Nigeria is the expertise that now exists in the country for the design and establishment of a protection monitoring database for IDPs, including the creation of data sets and the development of real-time reporting processes;

3. Joint monitoring with NHRIs can facilitate enhanced access to vulnerable IDPs in difficult security situations;

4. The UNHCR/NHRC partnership in Nigeria has been effective in garnering the attention of government in a way that may not have been possible if the two organizations had tried to work on these issues alone.

49

Background: The Philippines NHRI situation is somewhat unique in that there are two national human rights commissions in the country, the national CHR and the CHR-ARMM Regional Office based in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). UNHCR began engagement with the national CHR in 2009.

Salient features of UNHCR’s engagement with CHR of the Philippines:

• Invited national CHR to participate in protection cluster;

• Has supported protection monitoring, the development of IDP protection standards, training, and advocacy for IDP rights vis-à-vis government ministries and congress;

• Has funded a dedicated IDP unit within the national CHR;

• Advocated and financially supported the creation of a regional CHR office in Mindanao.

Lessons learnt:

1. Partnership with NHRIs can give UNHCR privileged access to key government entities, facilitating a stronger enabling environment for IDP protection;

2. More work is required by UNHCR and its UN partners to work jointly towards shared objectives that can leverage their complementary roles in ensuring sustainable relations with NHRIs;

3. Engagement with NHRIs and their inclusion in IDP protection issues and the Cluster system has enabled a clearer understanding of other government agencies of protection principals and their application.

4. The establishment of capable and well-resourced regional NHRI offices may be an approach that UNHCR wishes to duplicate in other countries where the national NHRI is not highly operational.

PhilippinesCOMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS (CHR) OF THE PHILIPPINES


Structure: Chairperson and four members appointed by the president; As of 2102, CHR had some 540 staff, 250 of which were in Manila and another 290 that were in regional offices.*

ICC status: “A”


INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT IN THE PHILIPPINES

Number of IDPs in country: 736,500

Protection cluster activation: Yes, nationalized since 2007


• Mixed caseload of disaster and conflict-induced IDPs in the country;

• Two separate but associated CHRs, one at the national level and one at the regional level (ARMM);

• UNHCR office believes its value added is primarily for the protection of conflict-induced IDPs rather than natural-disaster IDPs.

* CHR of the Philippines. 2012 Annual Report, prepared by the Strategic Development and Planning Office, 2013, http://goo.gl/gPF6C5

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