Thursday, October 22, 2009
African Union Commission chairman Jean Ping said the huge numbers of people who had fled their homes posed a threat to Africa's stability.
"It's the continent's future that is at stake," he told the opening of the two-day summit, due to ratify the Convention on the Protection and Assistance of the Displaced People in Africa.
The convention is the first of its kind aimed at internally displaced people, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres noted a "decline in the number of refugees," but said the vast majority have spent five years or more in camps.
"They are looking to you their leaders to give them hope and a future. This convention is a human rights landmark, an achievement that will remain in history," he told the summit.
While 46 countries were represented at the summit, only four -- Zambia, Zimbabwe, Somalia and the host country Uganda -- sent their head of state or government.
Political upheaval, conflicts and natural disasters have left Africa with the world's highest number of refugees and displaced.
The UN refugee agency says that in Africa alone it looks after some 10.4 million people and puts the number of displaced and refugees at 17 million.
Of that total 2.6 million are refugees; 295,000 are former refugees who have returned home; 6.3 million are internally displaced, 1.03 million displaced who have been settled elsewhere and 100,000 are stateless people.
Somalia's long-running conflict, instability in the Democratic Republic of Congo's eastern region and political violence in Kenya as well as other hotspots such as northern Uganda and south Sudan have caused massive population displacements.
Around a third of Somalia's 10 million people need relief aid due to a prolonged drought that has plunged the Horn of Africa country into its worst humanitarian crisis in 18 years.
Close to a sixth of the population is displaced.
As the summit got underway, at least 21 civilians died in an exchange of mortar and artillery fire in Mogadishu. Strife in the Somali capital has sent tens of thousands fleeing in recent months.
"We should ask ourselves what factors generate refugees and IDPs. As we all know the main factor is conflicts, wars within African countries," Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said.
"Therefore the main solution to the phenomenon is ensuring that conflicts do not take place and that the ongoing ones end fairly."
AU political affairs commissioner Julia Dolly Joiner said that while the number of refugees worldwide is declining, the number of internally displaced is on the increase and is now estimated at "between 12 and 14 million".
She called for greater efforts to establish political and economic stability in the continent's trouble spots.
"Improvements in governance, rapid economic development and more appropriate food security strategies are among the actions that will ensure that the root causes are addressed," she said.
On Wednesday, the AU executive council adopted the draft convention which calls for the prevention of forced displacement, protection of refugees and the displaced and helping victims of conflicts and natural disasters.
Under the convention, the draft of which was seen by AFP, countries will be required to provide special assistance for IDPs with special needs, including the elderly.
Last year, the 53-member bloc resolved to bolster the protection of refugees and displaced people, a move that was lauded as historic.
"But some African countries are reluctant to ratify the convention which would be restrictive and have legal consequences," an African diplomat told AFP.
Source: AFP, Oct 22, 2009