MOTION FOR A RECOMMENDATION on temporary protection for people forced to flee their country

9 October 1995

Doc. 7410

MOTION FOR A RECOMMENDATION on temporary protection for people forced to flee their country

presented by Mrs AGUIAR and others

This motion has not been discussed in the Assembly and commits only the members who have signed it

The Assembly,

1. Deeply concerned by the large numbers of people forced to flee their country because of armed conflicts, massive violations of human rights or generalised violence;

2. Noting that the above categories of people are generally not entitled to protection under the 1951 Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol;

3. Recalling that the situation in some parts of former Yugoslavia has forced more than four million people to leave their homes and that hundreds of thousands of them have been accepted under different temporary protection arrangements in many European countries;

4. Concerned by the continuing uncertainty and inadequacy of social rights for those granted temporary protection in many Council of Europe member states;

5. Considering therefore that steps must be taken without delay to clarify the situation of these people;

6. Recommend that the Committee of Ministers invite the member states:

- to elaborate a legal instrument on the protection of persons under temporary protection, specifying the minimum rights to which they are entitled;

- to upgrade, with any extension of their stay, the status of these persons, thus entitling them to more rights;

- to decide, at the end of a maximum period of two years, whether there is still need for protection and, if so, to transform the "temporary protection" into permanent refugee status in accordance with the Geneva Convention and its Protocol of 1967.

Signed:

Aguiar, Portugal, LDR

Lauricella, Italy, SOC

Billing, Sweden, EDG

Leitner, Hungary, EPP

Mészáros, Hungary, LDR

Hunt, United Kingdom, EDG

Atkinson, United Kingdom, EDG

Árnason, Iceland, LDR

Kukk, Estonia, EPP

Saudargas, Lithuania, EPP

Golu, Romania, SOC

Brennan, Ireland, LDR

* SOC : Socialist Group

EPP : Group of the European People's Party

EDG : European Democratic Group

LDR : Liberal, Democratic and Reformers Group

UEL : Group of the Unified European Left