Date: 25 November 2004

The Workshop on the Advocacy Booklet on the Guiding Principles on IDPs in Bangladesh was jointly organized by the Calcutta Research Group and Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK). It was held on November 25, 2004 at Research Institute of Bangladesh (RIB) conference room, Dhaka. The workshop was chaired by Sultana Kamal, Executive Director of Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK). Dr. Paula Banerjee represented the MCRG. Among the participants were scholars, lawyers, activists and victims of displacement.

The workshop began with some introductory remarks from DR. Shamsul Bari, Chairman, RIB and former official at UNHCR. Dr. Paula Banerjee introduced the project in South Asia under the collaboration of the Brookings Institution. The draft booklet, which was translated into Bangla along with the UN Guiding Principles on IDP was then presented, in brief, by Meghna Guhathakurta and Suraiya Begum. In-depth discussions on each section of the report were held with each commentator either representing the academia or the NGOs with a prolonged exposure and experience in the respective fields. The issues of discussion included: displacement due to river erosion, armed conflict, election violence, slum eviction, brothel eviction and shrimp cultivation. The in-depth discussion was followed by an open floor discussion. Several important suggestions were made for the revision of the booklet before the final publication and a forward-looking strategy for its dissemination was envisioned. The following are some key points, which could form the framework of such a strategy:

• A South Asian perspective of internal displacement should be reflected in the booklet.
• Definitions and categories of displacement that are specific to Bangladesh should be highlighted. The booklet may be distributed to all agencies working under the UN system in Bangladesh especially the UNHCR. Since it contains the first ever translation of the Guiding principles in Bangla, it should be especially useful at the grass-roots level.
• A group may be formed, which will carry on the work of dissemination of the booklet. All participants at the workshop expressed their interest in contributing towards such activities.
• An effective advocacy strategy should be formulated that is time-bound.
• It was even suggested that instead of or in addition to one booklet there could be several, each highlighting one particular type of displacement. This should be easy to read and illustrated for the benefit of victims of the particular type of displacement.
• A parallel media campaign is a must.
• Psychological aspects of displacement should also be adequately reflected.
• Internal displacement should be looked at together with increasing criminalization of the polity.
• Resistance to internal displacement should also be documented.

Date: 28 and 29 January 2005-01-31

The Centre for Northeast India, South and Southeast Asia Studies (CENISEAS) in collaboration with the CRG held a workshop on the Relevance of the U N Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in Guwahati, Assam. It was stated that the CRG project on IDPs is in collaboration with the Brookings Institutions project on IDPs. Because India is such a large country this workshop was meant to look closely at the situation of internally displaced people in Northeast India alone. In the inaugural session Sanjib Baruah, Senior Fellow CENISEAS said that Northeast India has the largest number of conflict induced IDPs in India yet they get little attention from either the government or the civil liberties activists and the national and international media. He said that indigenous people are the hardest hit as a result of conflict in Northeast India. He talked about 150,000 IDPs languishing in Kokrajhar camps and so he said that a translation of the Guiding Principles in vernacular languages might be a tool in the hands of the victim community. Paula Banerjee from CRG discussed how the Guiding Principles are based on international humanitarian and human rights laws. She also spoke on how the Guiding Principles are being translated and used in different countries of South Asia. Ranabir Samaddar, Director CRG and ANS Ahmed, Director Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Science released a bilingual booklet on the Guiding Principles in Assamese and English. The workshop was attended by many different organisations from Northeast India and also by members of different IDP camps such as Serang IDP camp, Adivasiya Sahitya Sabha, STTEP etc. There were a number of women’s rights activists, academics, researchers, lawyers and government administrators. There were over 50 participants in the workshop

Several important suggestions were made for carrying the programme forward:

• It was said that in the context of Northeast India it is not adequate to translate the Guiding Principles only in Assamese.
• The CENISEAS in collaboration with CRG agreed to translate it into Boro, Adivasi, Meitei and some other Northeast Indian languages in the future.
• The translated Guiding Principles, it was agreed should be sent to inmates of the camps, other victims, civil liberties organisations, media, administrators and the security personnel.
• CRG agreed to hold future workshops in IDP camps in collaboration with partner organisations in Northeast India. All participants at the workshop expressed their interest in contributing towards such activities.
• It was suggested that in depth empirical studies should be conducted in IDP camps because hardly any reliable data exists on them.
• It was also suggested that an information and media campaign could be organised around the visit of Professor Walter Kalin.
• Efforts should be made for better exchange of data among people working on IDPs.
• A network of interested people should be organised. This network should consists of activists, scholars, lawyers, victims of displacement and other state holders.

Date: 20 November 2004

A workshop on the Guiding Principles on Internally Displaced Persons in Nepal commenced at Kathmandu on November 20, 2004 with an objective to discuss on current situation of internally displaced persons and identify some strategies to address it. Thirty participants representing civil society and government participated in the workshop. There were NGO activists, academics, lawyers and administrators in the meeting that was held in Hotel Himalaya in Kathmandu.

Calcutta Research Group (CRG) in collaboration with the Brookings Institution supported the initiative realizing the needs to discuss on the Guiding Principles on Internally Displaced People and its relevance in the current context of conflict in Nepal. The Nepal Institute of peace (NIP) was the local organiser of this workshop.

There were three main objectives of the workshop as follows:

• Collect feedback on the draft advocacy booklet to finalize it;
• Promote use of the booklet for future advocacy activities,
• Prepare future strategies for working with conflict induced Internally Displaced people

The Nepali draft translations of the Guiding Principles were presented followed by discussions and recommendations. Moreover, two group discussions were held to finalize the future strategies for advocacy activities. The workshop commenced with an inaugural address of Mr. Som Niroula, Secretary NIP, followed by Dr. Samir Kumar Das, Secretary CRG. Mr. Niroula highlighted the objective of the workshop and the current IDPs situation in Nepal. He, then, stressed on the organizations objectives as developing a culture of Peace in Nepal through the means of promotion and protection of human rights. He also highlighted the conflict-induced IDPs’ problems in Nepal since the initiation of the conflict. Dr. Samir Kumar Das highlighted the UN Guiding principles and their relevance in South Asian context. Mr. Pradip Shankar Wagle, an advocate working on the human right issues, highlighted the Legal system in dealing with IDPs in Nepal. He argued that there is recognition of IDP’s as a result of developmental projects but there is no legal system to deal on IDP’s as a result of conflict. He said that if refugees have rights in another country, than the IDP’s should also have equal rights as the citizens of the country and the Constitution of Nepal should guarantee the same rights and equality as guaranteed by the constitution of Nepal to all its citizens. Ms. Ranjana Thapa, a lawyer and a woman activist, presented the situation of IDPs in the current context. Prof. Kapil Srhestha, Moderator, a human rights activist in Nepal, raised the question of identity of the large population which displaced after the state of emergency in Nepal. Mr. Achute Acharya, a Senior staff of the National Human Rights Commission, informed that NHRC created a IDPs desk in 2003. NHRC is trying to work in collaboration with the Asia Pacific Forum on the IDPs issues. Dharma Raj Neupane, the Chairperson of the Association of the Sufferers of the Maoist, Nepal (ASMN), shared his experiences in the workshop saying that most of the people who do not have affiliation with political parities flew to India or another country.

The reflection of the participants about the workshop and strategies for dissemination of the translated GPs was as follows:

• More emphasis should be given to prepare detailed strategies on the IDPs advocacy work in Nepal.
• Need of similar types of such training workshops with the translated GPs should be held outside the capital city.
• Addition of more case studies in the advocacy Nepali booklet relating to the IDP problem and strategy implementation would be beneficial.
• Initiate e-mail network to disseminate the translated GPs and advocacy booklet.
• Highlight the situation of the IDPs through District level workshops.
• Launch a campaign in collaboration with other organizations to develop a model law or policy to protect and promote the rights of IDPs.
• Conduct further research on the specific and general situation of IDPs

Date: 25 November 2004

The Aurat Foundation organized an orientation workshop on 25th November 2004 in Lahore, as part of the “Advocacy and Training Programme on the Relevance of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in South Asia” launched by CRG in collaboration with the Brookings Institution. Representatives from NGOs, media, donor organizations, lawyers associations, relief organizations, universities, and government actively participated in the workshop. Altogether there were 32 participants respectively from 22 organizations.

The main objective of the workshop was to:

• Raise awareness on the phenomenon of internal displacement with reference to UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement.
• Establish networking with participating organizations on issue of internal displacement.
• Work out a strategy to comprehensively and consistently address the issue of internal displacement in Pakistan.

Mr. Atta ur Rehman Sheikh (Coordinator, Pakistan) welcomed the participants, explained the objectives of the workshop and gave a brief introduction on the “Training and Advocacy on Relevance of UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in South Asia” launched by the Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (MCRG), India in collaboration with the Brookings Institution. A round of introductions of the participants followed.

Mr. I.A. Rehman (Director, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan) delivered the keynote address to set the tone of the workshop. He briefly highlighted the critical issues that needed to be dealt with reference to internal displacement in the political backdrop of Pakistan. He said that Pakistan is a land of displaced persons as it experienced two major exoduses during the partition and the Soviet-Afghan war. There is a long history of internal displacement in the country, yet this issue remained insignificant in terms of research and legislation. He mentioned the Mangla dam, Tarbela dam, Islamabad Capital Territory, Cholistan and ongoing Gawadar Port Project wherein human rights of people are being violated on a massive scale. Mr. Rehman argued that the issue of internal displacement is part of larger issue of governmental policies and human rights violations. Mr. Rehman congratulated the organizers of the workshop and their collaborators, which included Aurat Foundation, the Brookings Institute and MCRG, for taking initiative on such a pertinent issue.

The first working session was devoted to a detailed orientation on issues and concepts of internal displacement along with three presentations on conflict induced displacement. In the first working session, Dr. Sikandar Mehdi (Director, Migration and Refugee Studies Programme, Karachi University) made a presentation on the phenomenon of migration and displacement with reference to UN Guiding Principles. The second working session was devoted to presentations on development-induced displacement. However, one presentation on women and displacement, in order to look into the issue vis-à-vis gender perspective, was also incorporated in the session. In addition, a specific presentation on disaster and displacement was also part of post lunch session. All the participants of the workshop and speakers were full of praise for the workshop being first modest initiative of its kind in Pakistan. The participants and the speakers in the course of the presentations made the following recommendations and suggestions:

• Follow-up workshops, such as the one held, should be organized. The Migration and Refugee Study Programme of the Karachi University, the Migration Research Centre, Islamabad and the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Islamabad may play a role in terms of coordination among the persons and organizations working on this issue and organizing activities to raise awareness and research on internal displacement.
• In view of the general dearth of research work on internal displacement, research papers should be commissioned for quality research. This is also important to develop baseline data on the issue.
• There are organizations and persons, though few in numbers, working on this issue in various ways. They should be identified and brought together for broader coordination and cooperation. A reference directory should be prepared for this purpose.
• Organizations and institutions in and outside Pakistan should be contacted for resource mobilization to continue work on the issue on a longer-term basis.
• There should be widespread distribution of the Urdu version of the Guiding Principle as an advocacy tool.

Date: 10 March 2005

The National Peace Council organized a workshop on 10 March 2005 in Colombo as part of the “Advocacy and Training Programme on the Relevance of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement in South Asia” launched by CRG in collaboration with the Brookings Institution and discussed the issue of both war affected IDPs and Tsunami affected IDPs. There were 31 participants and they included representatives of UNICEF, Consortium of Humanitarian Agencies, Social Science Research Council, Human Rights Commission, Centre for Communication Training etc.

Jehan Perera said that the issues of war affected IDP’s was marginalized and was forgotten during the peace process. However Tsunami, although a great disaster proved to have a sliver lining as it brought the IDP issue into limelight once again. Many organizations that had different mandates have started working on IDP issues bringing it to the centre stage. He highlighted the differences between war-affected IDP’s and Tsunami affected IDP’s in the following manner.

Tsunami has reduced the negative impact on IDP’s. It has developed an opportunity in which Sri Lankans can address IDP concerns in an efficient manner, as plenty of resources are available because there is international focus. Aid that is received can be used for both war and tsunami victims, in an equitable manner.

Nilhan de mel said that the focus of the workshop was to discuss about how Sri Lankans should address the issues of Tsunami IDPs and War affected IDPs-

• Should they be addressed as a whole or should they address IDP issues separately?
• What are the civil society key initiatives and interests in IDP policy development?
• What are the key issues that should be addressed on IDPs? How could they be addressed?

Dharani Rajasingham said it is important to link post-tsunami and post-war displacement for equitable reconstruction, in order to ensure equability and peace. Post-tsunami situation is a great opportunity to address reconciliation and peace. Her recommendations included:

1. There should be an attempt to promote-multi-ethnic constituencies through resettlement, where cultural diversity and historical co-existence of communities will be prompted and protected.
2. Should consider the situation of local minorities as the Multi-cultural National Vision for Peace developed in 2003 should talk about local minorities. People who are most vulnerable for displacement are local minorities. Although this is suggested it is not yet picked up.
3. It is necessary to focus on conflict sensitivity and pro-poor action.
4. Consideration of historical conditions should be given in reconstruction.
5. Post Tsunami reconstruction affirmative action should be pro-poor.
6. Transparency is necessary for pro-poor reconstruction.
7. Conduct clear assessment of how much it will cost to rebuild houses.
8. Pro-poor policies of individuals to participate in reconstruction of housing are necessary.
9. Guiding principles on Internally Displacement is a valuable document but we have to contextualize according to Sri Lanka culture.

T. Jeyasingham spoke on the situation of minorities. He recommended the following:

• IDPs need caring people.
• We need much more government support.
• Developing better structures and Better warning system in the Coastal area rather then resettling the IDPs.
• Build confidence
• Ministries should be integrated
• Awareness should be created among people
• Decentralize the system and promote consultation

The meeting ended with a promise by participants to evolve programs on the basis of recommendations made.

Date: 14-15 March 2005

The review meeting held on 14 and 15 March in Trang Hotel Bangkok took notice of the translations of the UN Guiding Principles in various South Asian languages as a result of the South Asian campaign and drew satisfaction from the way in which all the advocacy workshops had been designed, planned, and executed in South Asia. Members of Forum Asia facilitated the meeting. The participants included:

Atta ur Rehman Sheikh, Aurat Foundation, Pakistan

Erin Mooney, Brookings Institution, USA

Meghna Guhathakurta, Ain O Salish Kendra and Dhaka University, Bangladesh

Nilhan de Mel, National Peace Council, Sri Lanka

Paula Banerjee, CRG, India

Ranabir Samaddar, Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (CRG), India

Samir Das, CRG, India

Sanjib Baruah, Centre for Policy Research, India

Som Niroula, Nepal Institute of Peace, Nepal

Suraiya Begum, Research Initiatives, Bangladesh

On the first day Ranabir Samaddar, the Director of the CRG, initiated the discussion. He began by portraying how the Tsunami had brought the issue of IDPs to the forefront in South Asia. He said displacement was no longer just a humanitarian issue, but a political one – it was a question of rights. Paula Banerjee stated that CRG was interested in issues of displacement, which stemmed from CRG’s interest in peace studies. She emphasised that CRG studies refugee issues as related to conflicts and rights. She thanked the Brookings Institution, and in particular Roberta Cohen for consistent inspiration and support to CRG’s work, on the IDPs who had been more vulnerable than refugees of this region where States have been most responsible in producing IDPs. According to Banerjee States have rarely produced well thought out policies on relief and rehabilitation of the IDPs and have failed to carry out measures with a long perspective. Whatever has happened as relief measures, has been the product of ad hoc steps taken by the states.

Erin Mooney from the Brookings Institution discussed the Brookings-Bern project that has made possible to facilitate this exercise in South Asia. She said that the project has a global mandate. This is particularly highlighted by the association of Walter Kalin who is currently Representative of the Secretary General on Human Rights of the IDPs. Kalin’s mandate include:

• Advocacy and dialogue with Governments and all groups involved.
• Promotion of the Guiding Principles.
• Mainstreaming human rights of IDPs – working with Governments, civil societies and media persons

Erin Mooney stated that Walter Kalin was scheduled to visit different parts of South Asia soon. Both Mooney and Ranabir Samaddar felt that Kalin’s planned visit could be considered an opportunity to highlight the rights of IDPs.

These initial discussions were followed by presentations made by country partners on their experiences of organising and facilitating the advocacy programme.