2. Refugees

Author(s):  
Gil Loescher

This chapter traces the history of refugees. Throughout all periods of human history, people have been forcibly displaced and have fled their homes as a consequence of political, ethnic, and religious persecution, and wars. The practice of receiving societies and religious institutions offering some form of protection, political belonging, and rights for the displaced has an equally long history. By the late 1940s, the newly created United Nations recognized the need to extend the existing international treaties and organizations regarding refugees particularly to meet the growing post-war refugee problem in Europe. The result was a process that established the contemporary global refugee regime.

Author(s):  
Amina Adanan

Abstract From the 17th century onwards, Britain played a leading role in asserting the application of the universality principle to international piracy, the first crime to which the principle applied. Thereafter, during the quest for abolition, it exercised universality over slave traders at sea. With the exercise of universal jurisdiction over atrocity crimes in the post-War period there was a notable shift in the UK position to the principle. This article traces the history of UK policy towards the application of the universality principle to atrocity crimes since wwii. Using archival research from the UK National Archives and the travaux préparatoires to international treaties, it analyses UK policy towards the inclusion of universal jurisdiction in international treaties concerning atrocity crimes. It argues that historically, the UK supported the application of the principle to atrocity crimes committed during an international armed conflict, as this position supported its interests. The nexus between universal jurisdiction and international armed conflict shielded colonial abuses from prosecution in foreign courts. Once the colonial period had come to an end, there was a shift in UK support for the inclusion of universal jurisdiction in international treaties, which is evident since the negotiation of uncat and the Rome Statute.


2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 163
Author(s):  
Karolina Dobrowolska

Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights at the United Nations and Their Doctrinal Background Summary The concept of sexual and reproductive health and rights still remains unclear in the international law regime. Despite the fact that during the United Nations International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo (1994), all UN Member States agreed that the term sexual and reproductive health and rights does not contain the “right to abortion,” one can observe continuous attempts to renegotiate the established consensus. The discussion on SRHR is exerting a great impact on the policy of international organizations and therefore it has a potential to create obligations on their Member States. The aim of this article is to present the history of the concept of “sexual and reproductive health and rights” and to analyze it in two aspects. First, the article elaborates on the doctrinal and ideological connotations of SRHR construction. It shows how the SRHR construction derives from feminist theories that regard the spheres of procreation and sexuality as the main sources of inequality between men and women. Second, the article shows how feminist concepts of human sexuality have influenced and shaped the legal constructions of international treaties under the UN auspices.


1995 ◽  
Vol 29 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 233-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karl-Heinz Ziegler

1. The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties of 1969 has defined in its art. 2 the international treaty as an international agreement between states concluded in written form. Only in art. 3 the said Convention makes clear that other international agreements might be valid, too. The United Nations Charter art. 102 ensures that international treaties concluded by the member states are registered and published by the Secretariat of the United Nations. These rules and the practice of our actual Law of Nations are the results of a complicated development which has its origins in antiquity. From the early beginnings in the third millenium B.C. until the 16th century A.D. we can observe that international treaties, in spite of their being reported, registered and passed on in written form, are concluded not through written instruments, but through declarations of the treaty-making parties, solemnly confirmed by mutual oaths. We shall not delve into the history of medieval and modern international law but limit our observations to the legal history of preclassical and classical antiquity, which Reuven Yaron has enriched by so many important contributions.


Author(s):  
C. Claire Thomson

Building on the picture of post-war Anglo-Danish documentary collaboration established in the previous chapter, this chapter examines three cases of international collaboration in which Dansk Kulturfilm and Ministeriernes Filmudvalg were involved in the late 1940s and 1950s. They Guide You Across (Ingolf Boisen, 1949) was commissioned to showcase Scandinavian cooperation in the realm of aviation (SAS) and was adopted by the newly-established United Nations Film Board. The complexities of this film’s production, funding and distribution are illustrative of the activities of the UN Film Board in its first years of operation. The second case study considers Alle mine Skibe (All My Ships, Theodor Christensen, 1951) as an example of a film commissioned and funded under the auspices of the Marshall Plan. This US initiative sponsored informational films across Europe, emphasising national solutions to post-war reconstruction. The third case study, Bent Barfod’s animated film Noget om Norden (Somethin’ about Scandinavia, 1956) explains Nordic cooperation for an international audience, but ironically exposed some gaps in inter-Nordic collaboration in the realm of film.


2004 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 188-197 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nur Masalha

In 1948 an official ‘Transfer Committee’ was appointed by the Israeli Cabinet to plan the Palestinian refugees' resettlement in the Arab states. Apart from doing everything possible to reduce the Arab population in Israel, the Transfer Committee sought to amplify and consolidate the demographic transformation of Palestine by: preventing the Palestinian refugees from returning to their homes; the destruction of Arab villages; settlement of Jews in Arab villages and towns; and launching a propaganda campaign to discourage Arab return. One of the Transfer Committee's initiatives was to invite Dr Joseph Schechtman, a right-wing Zionist Revisionist leader and expert on ‘population transfer’, to join its efforts. In 1952 Schechtman published a propagandists work entitled The Arab Refugee Problem. Since then Schechtman would become the single most influential propagator of the Zionist myth of ‘voluntary’ exodus in 1948. This article examines the leading role played by Schechtman in promoting Israeli propaganda and politics of denial. Relying on newly-discovered Israeli archival documents, the article deals with little known and new aspects of the secret history of the post-1948 period.


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