United Nations Convention Relating To The Status Of Refugees

The United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees is an international structure by which people at risk of persecution within their own countries can be protected. The structure provides that such people should always be accepted in the territory of the receiving country and ought not to be turned away under Article 33 of the convention. However, the Convention and the subsequent 1967 Protocol are inefficient and do not meet the needs of refugees in this current era. The Convention was focused on refugee problems in the 1950s and has faced numerous operational challenges in many countries (Aukot, 2013).

The Convention, with its amendment in 1967 is the centre of international protection of refugees. It has been ratified by 144 states out of the 192 member states of the United Nations, with some states ratifying the Convention, the Protocol or both as per statistics released in August 2008. This is the most ratified treaty on refugees and is closely associated with protection structures by the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees.

According to Gibney & Loescher (2010) the 1951 Convention relating to the status of refugees was adopted after a resolution by the United Nations General Assembly in 1950 and became effective in April 1954. According to the Convention, a refugee under Article 1A paragraph 1 is defined as a person who owing to a well founded fear of persecution on the basis of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or a political opinion is outside the country of nationality and is unable or unwilling due to that fear to avail himself to the protection of that country.

The term well founded fear of persecution at the time of adoption of the Convention was to be caused by eve...

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...ese people are not welcome in those countries because they are not needed to provide unskilled labour and there is no ideological and strategic benefit to issuing asylum. There has been a vast increase in the number of asylum seekers and governments have not seen the need to expand the Convention to cover outdated grounds.

In conclusion, the Convention was useful in its application on refugee matters during the period it was formed; however, the Convention and its Protocol have been overtaken by events in the current scenario. Further, there has been inconsistency in its interpretation and application, particularly from states considered as countries of origin or states of habitual residence and receiving states thereby creating tension between those states. However, the Convention is still the most comprehensive international structure dealing with refugee matters.