Soft Law and the Protection of Vulnerable Migrants

Since the 1980s, an increasing number of people have crossed international borders outside of regularized migration channels, whether by land, air or sea. Policy debates on these kinds of movements have generally focused on security to the neglect of a focus on rights. In a range of situations, though, irregular migrants, who fall outside of the protection offered by international refugee law and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), may have protection needs and, in some cases, an entitlement to protection under international human rights law. Such protection needs may result from conditions in the country of origin or as a result of circumstances in the host or transit countries. However, this article argues that despite the existence of international human rights norms that should, in theory, protect such people, there remains a fundamental normative and institutional gap in the international system. Rather than requiring new hard law treaties to fill the gap, the article argues that a “soft law” framework should be developed to ensure the protection of vulnerable irregular migrants, based on two core elements: first, the consolidation and application of existing international human rights norm into sets of guiding principles for different groups of vulnerable irregular migrants; and second, improved mechanisms for inter-agency collaboration to ensure implementation of these norms and principles. This article suggests that learning from the precedent of developing the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement and its corresponding institutional framework can be particularly instructive in this regard

Finite quotients of Z[C_n]-lattices and Tamagawa numbers of semistable abelian varieties

We investigate the behaviour of Tamagawa numbers of semistable principally polarised abelian varieties in extensions of local fields. In view of the Raynaud parametrisation, this translates into a purely algebraic problem concerning the number of $H$-invariant points on a quotient of $C_n$-lattices $\Lambda/e\Lambda'$ for varying subgroups $H$ of $C_n$ and integers $e$. In particular, we give a simple formula for the change of Tamagawa numbers in totally ramified extensions (corresponding to varying $e$) and one that computes Tamagawa numbers up to rational squares in general extensions. As an application, we extend some of the existing results on the $p$-parity conjecture for Selmer groups of abelian varieties by allowing more general local behaviour. We also give a complete classification of the behaviour of Tamagawa numbers for semistable 2-dimensional principally polarised abelian varieties, that is similar to the well-known one for elliptic curves. The appendix explains how to use this classification for Jacobians of genus 2 hyperelliptic curves given by equations of the form $y^2=f(x)$, under some simplifying hypotheses.Comment: Two new lemmas are added. The first describes permutation representations, and the second describes the dependence of the B-group on the maximal fixpoint-free invariant sublattice. Contact details and bibliographic details have been update

Un nuevo enfoque para los viejos problemas: Solutions Alliance

A lo largo de los últimos tres años, Solutions Alliance ha ido surgiendo gradualmente como una iniciativa compuesta por distintas partes interesadas en superar lo que viene a ser la división entre las labores humanitarias y de desarrollo

Towards a ‘Soft Law' Framework for the Protection of Vulnerable Irregular Migrants

Since the 1980s, an increasing number of people have crossed international borders outside of formal, regularised migration channels, whether by land, air or sea. Policy debates on these kinds of movements have generally focused on security and control, to the neglect of a focus on rights. In a range of situations, though, irregular migrants, who fall outside of the protection offered by international refugee law and UNHCR, may have protection needs and, in some cases, an entitlement to protection under international human rights law. Such protection needs may result from conditions in the country of origin or as a result of circumstances in the host or transit countries. However, this article argues that, despite the existence of international human rights norms that should, in theory, protect such people, there remains a fundamental normative and institutional gap in the international system. Rather than requiring new hard law treaties to fill the gap, the article argues that a ‘soft law' framework should be developed to ensure the protection of vulnerable irregular migrants, based on two core elements: firstly, the consolidation and application of existing international human rights norms into sets of guiding principles for different groups; secondly, improved mechanisms for inter-agency collaboration to ensure implementation of these norms and principles. The article suggests that learning from the precedent of developing the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, and its corresponding institutional framework, could be particularly instructive in this regar

Reasentamiento: ¿dónde está la evidencia y cuál es la estrategia?

Los fines y objetivos del reasentamiento se especifican de forma escasa y los resultados no se miden de manera correcta. Para que el reasentamiento sea efectivo, necesita una base de evidencia mucho más sólida y una mejor coordinación a nivel internacional

Preguntas para la comunidad internacional sobre la gobernanza

La Iniciativa Nansen destaca importantes cuestiones sobre cómo debería la comunidad internacional pensar de forma colectiva sobre el desplazamiento y otras cuestiones de movilidad relacionadas con los desastres naturales y el cambio climático, y cómo mejorar la gobernanza al respecto

El gobierno global de la migración a causa de las crisis

No existe ningún marco de gobierno global coherente o unificado para las diferentes áreas que han sido incluidas bajo el paraguas del concepto de migración a causa de las crisis. Esto no quiere decir que sea necesario que se creen nuevas instituciones cuando surjan nuevos retos o etiquetas. Abordar las nuevas lagunas de protección como aquellas relacionadas con la migración a causa de las crisis requiere creatividad a la hora mejorar el funcionamiento de las instituciones existentes mediante la implementación, la institucionalización y los acuerdos internacionales