The lost IDP’s
UNHCR is the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees. Their mandate is to “to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide”. It’s primary purpose is “to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country.”
In their publication The State of the World’s Refugees 2006, their first figure is a table showing the situation of the world’s refugee population:
First off, notice how there are no IDPs “of concern to UNHCR” in “Northern America”. Why they don’t use North America I do not understand, but this is probably to differentiate the Caribbean from the rest of North America, most likely to get Haiti out of the mix with the United States. Fair enough. Now, let’s see, 2006 came right after 2005, right? And in 2005 Hurricane Katrina destroyed thousands of homes in the US, sending tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of people from Louisiana and Mississippi out searching for new homes. IDP’s are Internally Displaced Persons: Nationals of a country who, not having left the country, cannot be classified as refugees. Or, “persons or groups of persons who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflict, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights or natural or human-made disasters, and who have not crossed an internationally recognized State border.” (my italics)
So. The United States did not classify their IDPs as IDPs. They did not solve the problem - and from what I’ve heard, there are still several people from the affected areas living as IDPs in the US. But what’s more, UNHCR - an international institution - hasn’t had the decency to list these IDPs. Amnesty International has complained, Amnesty America has complained. It wouldn’t be good for the US if word got out that “the most powerful nation on Earth” couldn’t solve its own IDP problem. Of course, strictly speaking, UNHCR can’t do anything about IDP’s. But recognition of their situation is imperative to the improvement of their living conditions.
This is a brief example of how the UNHCR conducts business. This shows that they do sway to political pressure. It also shows that they’re not willing to do whatever is necessary (e.g. pissing off a major financier) to fulfill their mandate. And that is dangerous.
Finally: I am complaining some years too late. By now most of the people displaced by the ineptitude of the US government’s response during Hurricane Katrina will have found themselves at least a semi-permanent place to live. Even if we’re just talking about FEMA trailers.
