NHRCK held an International Conference on Refugee Rights in cooperation with Human Asia and the Graduate School of International Studies of Korea University on August 21 under the theme of Cooperation between Governments and Civil Society to Protect and Promote Refugee Rights.
Especially, this international conference commenced with a keynote speech of Ms. Barbara Harrel-Bond, Director of Fahamu Refugee Programme at the University of Oxford. Also, the meeting was attended by many experts from Asia-Pacific Refugee Rights (APRRN) which is the biggest regional network for refugees in Asia.
A refugee is referred to as a person who is out of the country of his/her nationality seeking asylum owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion. In particular, refugees usually face a risky situation worse than other immigrants since they are the victim of human rights violation by their own Government.
According to UNHCR, the number of refugees is over 10 million people. Like refugees, protection is still needed for many groups of people such as applicants for a special protection, the internally displaced or the stateless who are approximately over 30 million. As of June 2012, the Korean Government granted 291 persons refugee status out of 4,593 applicants.
The international community adopted the 1951 Refugee Convention and 1967 its Protocol providing State’s special responsibility to protect refugees. In addition, Article 5 of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action highlights the importance of State’s responsibility to protect human rights from the perspective of humanity. It stipulates “While the significance of national and regional particularities and various historical, cultural and religious backgrounds must be borne in mind, it is the duty of States, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms”
The Republic of Korea also acceded to the Refugee Convention and its Protocol in 1992 and added provisions related to refugees in the Immigration Control Act in 1993 and in the Enforcement Decree of the Immigration Control Act in 1994. In addition, a Refugee Act which laid ground for the protection of refugee rights was legislated at the end of 2011 and expectedly will enter into force on July 2013. However, refugee acceptance rate of Korea is 6.3% which is very low compared to that of other developed countries. Moreover, process for granting the refugee status should be more transparent and fair. The social status of refugee is also below the international standards including the Refugee Convention.
This international conference will be a forum for sharing challenges that refugees face everyday and effective countermeasures thereof among experts at home and abroad. NHRCK hopes this conference motivates the public to know more about refugees and their rights.
