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Human Rights Watch Work on Refugee and Internally Displaced Women; Gender-Based Asylum Claims U.N.: Strengthen Resolution on Darfur Letter to the U.N. Security Council As the U.N. Security Council debates a binding resolution on Darfur, Human Rights Watch reiterates its findings and calls on the body to do more to protect civilians. July 28, 2004 Letter Printer friendly version Sudan: New Darfur Documents Ties Between Government and Janjaweed Militias Confirmed Sudan government documents incontrovertibly show that government officials directed recruitment, arming and other support to the ethnic militias known as the Janjaweed, Human Rights Watch said today. The government of Sudan has consistently denied recruiting and arming the Janjaweed militias, including during the recent visits of U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. July 20, 2004 Press Release Also available in 
Printer friendly version The Rights of Non-Citizens NGO Joint Statement Addressed to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination Drafted in collaboration with Friends World Committee for Consultation, International Catholic Migrantion Commission and International Commission of Jurists, this joint statement discusses the rights of non-citizens in the context of CERD's March 2004 thematic discussion on non-citizens and discrimination. The signatories to the statement urge CERD to address, among other matters, administration of justice, measures of removal from territory, and duty of States to guarantee the prohibition of discrimination against non-citizens. The statement also highlights concerns related to several particuarly vulnerable non-citizen groups, including migrant workers, stateless persons, refugees and asylum seekers, women and children. March 25, 2004 Memorandum Nepal/Bhutan: Bilateral Talks Fail to Solve Refugee Crisis International Community Should Take Concerted Action The latest round of talks between the governments of Bhutan and Nepal to resolve the Bhutanese refugee crisis has failed to provide a solution, a coalition of five leading nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) said today. Donor countries should convene an international conference to devise a solution to the longstanding crisis. October 28, 2003 Press Release Printer friendly version Nepal/Bhutan: Refugee Women Face Abuses UNHCR, Governments Must Take Action at ExCom Bhutanese refugee women in Nepal encounter gender-based violence and systematic discrimination in access to aid, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. (in Nepali) September 24, 2003 Press Release Also available in
Printer friendly version Trapped by Inequality Bhutanese Refugee Women in Nepal Bhutanese refugee women in Nepal encounter gender-based violence and systematic discrimination in access to aid.This 77-page report examines the uneven response of UNHCR and the government of Nepal to rape, domestic violence, sexual and physical assault, and trafficking of girls and women from refugee camps. These problems persist despite reforms UNHCR introduced after internal investigations uncovered “sexual exploitation” of refugee women and girls by aid workers in Nepal and West Africa in 2002. The Human Rights Watch report shows how Nepal’s laws constrain the prosecution of gender-based violence. Specific domestic violence legislation does not exist in Nepal. A 35-day statute of limitations and burdensome medical reporting procedures prevent rape victims from filing complaints with the police and pressing criminal charges. The same obstacles have prevented any prosecution of aid workers and Nepalese government employees accused of “sexual exploitation” in October 2002. HRW Index No.: C1508 September 24, 2003 Report Download PDF Purchase online Struggling Through Peace Return and Resettlement in Angola The Angolan government and the United Nations are failing to ensure the safe and voluntary return of millions of Angolans to their homes. This 29-page report documents several incidents of government authorities using violence, or the threat of violence, to drive people out of camps where they had been living sometimes for years. The report also raises concerns about reported incidents of rape and other sexual violence against internally displaced women and returning refugees. Hundreds of Angolan refugees have spontaneously returned to their homes since the ceasefire of April 2002, but millions of internally displaced people, refugees and ex-combatants remain in exile, in transit or in temporary resettlement sites within Angola. Rather than paying special attention to children, women, and vulnerable groups, the Angolan government has granted preference to ex-combatants for resettlement. The government has also failed to provide people with identity documents that would help them get access to humanitarian assistance, which is in any case inadequate. The report urges the Angolan government and international agencies to ensure reasonably uniform conditions in the areas to which the internally displaced, refugees, and former combatants will return, and to pay special attention to the needs of women, children and other vulnerable groups. Most importantly, the Angolan government must respect international and domestic law requiring the voluntary basis on which displaced people should be resettled. HRW Index No.: A1516 August 15, 2003 Report Also available in 
Download PDF Purchase online “We Don’t Want to Be Refugees Again” Human Rights Watch urged Bhutan and Nepal to implement a screening and repatriation process that protects the human rights of more than one hundred thousand refugees of Nepalese ethnicity who were arbitrarily stripped of their citizenship and forced to flee Bhutan in the early 1990s. May 13, 2003 Background Briefing Download PDF Printer friendly version Nepal/Bhutan : Sexual Abuse Highlights Plight of Refugees Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch warned today that new allegations of sexual abuse of women and children among Bhutanese refugees in Nepal show the human cost of one of the world's unresolved and forgotten refugee problems. November 22, 2002 Press Release Printer friendly version Closed Door Policy: Afghan Refugees in Pakistan and Iran The Human Rights Watch report, "Closed Door Policy: Afghan Refugees in Pakistan and Iran," cautions against a hasty repatriation of Afghan refugees while conditions in Afghanistan remain unstable. Human Rights Watch interviewed many refugees, including members of various ethnic groups, and women and girls, who fear continuing human rights abuses inside Afghanistan. The decades long Afghan refugee emergency did not end with the fall of the Taliban. There remain three and a half million refugees in Pakistan and Iran, the vast majority of whom arrived before the current armed conflict. Although one hundred forty thousand Afghans went home from Pakistan and Iran in the past six weeks, fifty thousand new refugees fled Afghanistan to Pakistan during the same time period. Refugees interviewed by Human Rights Watch in Pakistan described the human toll caused by that government's treatment of the refugee population: With borders closed, most refugees had to resort to dangerous and unofficial routes into Pakistan. Refugees were beaten at unofficial checkpoints when they could not afford to pay extortionate bribes. At official crossing points, families were beaten back, or languished in squalor without food, water or latrines-hoping to be let in. Once inside Pakistan, refugees were harassed and imprisoned because they lacked identity documents. They also endured beatings by Pakistani police when queuing for food in camps. 45 pp. 7.00 HRW Index No.: (G1402) February 27, 2002 Report Download PDF Purchase online Afghan Refugees Mistreated in Exile, but Afraid to Go Home With repatriation from Pakistan and Iran slated to begin this week, many Afghan refugees are afraid to return to Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. February 26, 2002 Press Release Also available in 
Printer friendly version No Safe Refuge The Impact of the September 11 Attacks on Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Migrants in the Afghanistan Region and Worldwide The backlash against refugees, asylum seekers and migrants throughout the world is a serious side effect of the September 11 attacks. While governments have legitimate security concerns, there must be a balance with human rights and refugee protection standards. October 18, 2001 Background Briefing Download PDF Printer friendly version Safe Refuge Must Be Provided For Afghan Refugees The lives of thousands of Afghan civilians are being placed at risk by border control and immigration policies that have tightened since the September 11 attacks in the United States, Human Rights Watch said today. September 21, 2001 Press Release Also available in
Printer friendly version Press Kit on Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and Internally Displaced Persons Backgrounder for the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance Throughout the world, refugees, asylum seekers, migrants and internally displaced persons are the victims of racial discrimination, racist attacks, xenophobia and ethnic intolerance. Racism is both a cause and a product of forced displacement, and an obstacle to its solution. In 2000, some 150 million migrants were living outside their countries of birth. Of these, some 50 million people were forcibly displaced as a result of persecution, conflict, and human rights violations. August 31, 2001 Background Briefing Guinea: Refugees Subject to Serious Abuse Relocation from Border Area is Not Enough Refugees in Guinea are vulnerable to serious human rights abuse at the hands of Guinean authorities and civilian vigilantes, Human Rights Watch said in the report "Refugees Still at Risk:Continuing Refugee Protection Concerns in Guinea." July 5, 2001 Press Release Also available in
Printer friendly version Refugees Still at Risk: Continuing Refugee Protection Concerns in Guinea Refugees in Guinea are vulnerable to serious human rights abuse at the hands of Guinean authorities and civilian vigilantes, Human Rights Watch says in this report. Guinean security personnel and civilians regularly harass refugees near their camps or as they move through the country to safer areas. Checkpoints along the roads are particularly dangerous locations, where refugees are often subjected to arbitrary strip searches, beatings, sexual assault and extortion. In the report, "Refugees Still at Risk: Continuing Refugee Protection Concerns in Guinea," Human Rights Watch has also documented the cases of refugees who were tortured or beaten to death while detained in Forecariah Prison, southeast of Conakry. For a decade, Guinea has hosted several hundred thousand refugees who have fled the conflicts in Liberia and Sierra Leone. This is one of the largest refugee populations in Africa, surpassed only by that in Tanzania, which is a bigger country. More than 40,000 of these refugees have recently been relocated from embattled border areas to camps in the interior of Guinea. Despite this improvement, the refugees' long-term safety is still under threat, Human Rights Watch said. HRW Index No.: A1305 July 1, 2001 Report Download PDF Purchase online Letter to UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Ruud Lubbers We are greatly concerned, however, by reports that you are actively seeking a reassessment of the refugee status of up to 1.5 million Afghans currently residing in camps in Pakistan and their repatriation to Afghanistan, on the grounds that the Taliban have consolidated their control over much of Afghanistan, and that the civil war from which the refugees fled has now abated. May 1, 2001 Letter Sexual Violence within the Sierra Leone Conflict Throughout the nine year Sierra Leonean conflict there has been widespread and systematic sexual violence against women and girls including individual and gang rape, sexual assault with objects such as firewood, umbrellas and sticks, and sexual slavery. In thousands of cases, sexual violence has been followed by the abduction of women and girls and forced bondage to male combatants in slavery-like conditions often accompanied by forced labor. February 26, 2001 Background Briefing Seeking Protection Addressing Sexual and Domestic Violence inTanzania's Refugee Camps Burundian refugee women confront daily violence in Tanzanian refugee camps, Human Rights Watch charges in a new report released today. Wide-spread sexual and domestic abuse have left many of these women physically battered, psychologically traumatized, and fearful for their lives HRW Index No.: 2483 October 1, 2000 Report Purchase online Tanzania: Violence against Women Refugees Report Documents UNHCR Failures Burundian refugee women confront daily violence in Tanzanian refugee camps, Human Rights Watch charges in a new report, "Seeking Protection: Addressing Sexual and Domestic Violence in Tanzania's Refugee Camps." September 26, 2000 Press Release Also available in
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