Preventive Action for Refugee Producing Situations

48 Chapter 2
concerned that it did not sufficiently consider such principles as the right to
leave one's country and the freedom from compulsion to return to a country
where one's personal safety would be in jeopardy.
In its final report, established by consensus among the twenty-five
participating country representatives, the UN Group spelled out specific
obligations of all member states, 71 and gave specific recommendations for
action to the UN main organs 72 and the Secretary-General. 73 These
recommendations transcended purely humanitarian actions and moved into
the political realm, at the same time establishing innovative approaches for
preventive measures.
Although the governmental experts could not fully overcome the deeply
rooted political differences among their views, the group was nevertheless
able to bring about a consensus in concluding its work. Whereas the experts
from Western nations and the developing world favored strengthening the
authority of the Secretary-General to prevent conflicts, the USSR
representative maintained that the UN political organs already had
sufficient means at its disposal to avert new refugee flows. The USSR
expert reaffirmed the responsibility of the Security Council for this task,
attempting at the same time to block the investment of greater authority in
the Secretary-General. 74
In general, both superpowers were long reluctant to recognize any
significant authority of the U.N. in resolving major political conflicts.
Gorbachev's recent statement in support of strengthening the prestige of
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71 These include respecting the principles contained in the UN Charter, using
peaceful means to resolve international conflicts, doing all within their means
to prevent new massive flows of refugees, refraining from creating causes that
lead to refugee flows, and cooperating with each another to prevent future
massive flows of refugees. UN doc. A/41/324,13 May 1986, pp. 16-17.
72 The major United Nations bodies were counseled to make fuller use of their
respective competencies under the Charter for the prevention of new massive
refugee flows. UN doc. A/41/324,13 May 1986, p. 17.
73 The Secretary-General was urged to give continuing attention to the question
of averting new massive flows of refugees, to ensure timely and fuller
information on potential refugee situations, to improve the coordination within
the Secretariat on situations which might give rise to refugee flows, and
improve the coordination, within the Secretariats, of the efforts of the United
Nations organs and specialized agencies and of concerned member states for
timely and more effective action. UN doc. A/41/324,13 May 1986, p. 18.
74 Peter J. Opitz, "Refugee Policy and the German Initiative," Forty Years of the
United Nations: Peace- keeping and Peace-making Activities. The Role of the
Federal Republic of Germany. Hamburg: Interpress Verlag (1985), p. 324.
Empirical Examination 49
the United Nations represents, however, a shift in the USSR position, which,
if maintained, can provide new momentum for preventive action. 75 By virtue
of joining the consensus achieved in the U.N. Group's final report, the USSR
agreed to recognize states' obligations to respect principles of international
law as spelled out in the recommendations of the report.
This concession is one indicator of "glasnost." Another sign of the
USSR's increased interest in human rights and refugee questions is that for
the first time there was a USSR observer at the 1987 Meeting of the
Executive Committee of the High Commissioner's Program [for Refugees]
in Geneva. 76
Overall, this FRG initiative accomplished more than just providing an
international forum for experts from refugee-producing, refugee-resettling,
and refugee program-funding countries to pursue their own interests in
reducing their share of the burden caused by refugee problems. To have so
many governments reach a consensus on positive recommendations for
action provides an important basis for furthering governmental commitment
to preventing refugee producing situations.
2.1.2. Rapporteur for Human Rights and Mass Exoduses
The phenomenon of mass movements, which involved more than 10 million
people by 1980, causes not only economic and social problems but also
political tensions and conflict. For the victims of forced migration and
displacement, the three traditional solutions - resettlement elsewhere,
settlement in the country of first asylum, and voluntary repatriation - are
increasingly difficult to find. Therefore many governments feel a need to
study mass exoduses in the context of human rights in the hope that curbing
human rights violations will help limit refugee flows.
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75 Mikhail Gorbachev, speech at the 70th anniversary of the October Revolution,
November 2,1987.
76 A number of further indications could be cited here that indicate a distinct
shift in the USSR's position toward humanitarian, human rights, and refugee
issuees. They include avantgardist publications on these issues, which are
increasingly translated and published in the USSR. See The Report of the
Independent Commission on International Humanitarian Issues (ICIHI),
Winning the Human Race, (London: Zed Books, 1988), p. 205; and ICIHI,
Refugees: Dynamics of Displacements, (Russian ed., Moscow: International
Relations Publishing House, 1987).