The threat of persecution mobilizes people to take decisive decisions. Feeling insecure in a territory due to racial, religious or even political discrimination has displaced people from their countries and turned them into refugees in need of international protection.
A refugee is "a person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of his country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to that country"as defined in the Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees of July 1951.
Refugee status is possible when the government or local authorities have demonstrated an inability to provide protection and compliance with basic human rights.. In the country of asylum a refugee is entitled to enjoy minimum security conditions that include more than physical security, i.e. support to attain the same civil rights possessed by any foreigner who is a legal resident in the place of asylum, including freedom of thought and movement, medical care and the right to work in the case of adults.
Who decides refugee status?
The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) warns that a person is a refugee if it meets the established conditions, regardless of whether or not it has been recognized as such by governments.
Governments should be responsible for defining the legal procedures for defining such status.In all these processes, UNHCR offers assistance and advice with the intention of protecting refugees and monitoring the application of the Geneva Convention. In all these processes, UNHCR offers assistance and advice with the intention of protecting refugees and monitoring the application of the Geneva Convention.
Given the conditions under certain political and social circumstancesAs a result of the refugee crisis, experienced especially in Latin American countries, UNHCR has broadened the concept and definition of refugee in order to extend assistance to citizens living in truly difficult situations that compromise their integrity within their countries. In this sense, the Cartagena Declaration on Refugees, developed in 1984, includes as refugees those persons who have fled their nations because their lives, safety or freedom have been threatened due to generalized violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, mass rape, etc., as well as those who have been forced to flee their countries of origin. of human rights or other circumstances that considerably disturb public order.
Once a person's refugee status has been determinedThe refugee status is retained unless one of the cessation clauses is applied. The strict approach to refugee status is based on providing them with unshakable security and assuring them that their status will not be subject to constant review of the situation in their country of origin.
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