Mandate Refugees: “Persons who are recognized as refugees by UNHCR acting under the authority of its Statute and relevant UN General Assembly resolutions. Mandate status is especially significant in States that are not parties to the 1951 Convention or its 1967 Protocol.” (UNHCR)
–Global Definition Project
www.globaldetentionproject.org/resources/glossary.html. [Accessed 28 August 2013]
“Persons who are recognised as refugees by UNHCR acting under the authority of its Statute and relevant UN General Assembly resolutions. Mandate status is especially significant in States that are not parties to the 1951 Convention or its 1967 Protocol.”
-International Catholic Migration Commission, Appendices and Glossary. http://www.icmc.net/glossary/term/307. [Accessed 25 August 2013].
“There is no explicit norm in the [1951 Convention or the 1967 Protocol] or …UNHCR Statute…which would provide UNHCR with the competence to conduct individual RSD. The function is explained as part of UNHCR’s international refugee protection Mandate … UNHCR does not need an invitation by the state in order to exercise its protection function, including RSD. Lacking any explicit legal basis,…‘UNHCR’s Mandate allows it to choose to do RSD, but it has no specific duty to conduct RSD’… Although no formal approval of UNHCR’s RSD activity is needed, conclusion of some sort of legal agreements (either in the form of standard UNHCR Cooperation Agreement or Memorandum of Understanding) has been one of the priorities of the Office of the High Commissioner.”
– Smrkolj, Maja. 2010. “International Institutions and Individualized Decision-making: An Example of UNHCR’s Refugee Status Determination” in ed. Armin von Bogdandy et al., The Exercise of Public Authority by International Institutions: Advancing International Institutional Law. Berlin: Springer, 165-193.
“Refugee status determination pursuant to UNHCR’s mandate is a core UNHCR refugee protection function. The purpose of mandate is to permit UNHCR to determine whether asylum seekers fall within the criteria for international refugee protection. The determination of refugee status has potentially profound implications for the life and security of the individuals concerned. It also defines the obligations of UNHCR towards the individuals, and may also determine the obligations and the responsibilities of governments and other actors whom the UNHCR cooperates to protect refugees. The effectiveness of mandate RSD as a protection function depends upon the fairness and integrity of the UNHCR RSD procedures and the quality of the RSD decisions.”
-UNHCR, Procedural Standards for Refugee Status Determination Under UNHCR’s Mandate, 1 September 2005, Unit 1, Introduction, pp. 1-1. http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/home/opendocPDFViewer.html?docid=4317223c9&query=mandate%20refugee%20status. [Accessed 28 August 28, 2013] [Emphasis in the original.]
“In forty-four countries UNHCR decides on refugee applications, either in lieu of a government procedure or on behalf of a government. In twenty-two other countries, UNHCR shares responsibility for refugee status determinations with a government, often playing a decisive role for official decisions. A mandate refugee is defined as an individual living in his own country, or in a third country, who has been granted refugee status by UNHCR. A convention refugee is defined as an individual who has been granted refugee status by a state on the basis of the implementation of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 protocol. Convention refugees are typically given status by European and North American countries… UNHCR grants refugee status based on the Statute of the UNHCR and the precedent set by the Statute’s practical implementation over time.”
– Bianchini, Kate. 2010. “The Mandate Refugee Program: a Critical Discussion.” International Journal of Refugee Law 22 (3), p. 368.
“UNHCR performance of RSD poses protection challenges because it is founded on a basic contradiction. On the one hand, government action is essential for effective refugee protection. On the other hand, UNHCR RSD is premised on at least partial government failure. Neither direct concern for protection from non-refoulement nor strict legal obligations completely explain UNHCR’s current RSD activities. UNHCR’s RSD activities seem best explained by what Goodwin-Gill has called ‘negative responsibility’, and hence can represent a risky shift of responsibility from governments to the UN. At the same time, in some circumstances UNHCR RSD substantially advances refugee rights. In order to match its actual mandate and resources, UNHCR should perform RSD when it can enhance the protection provided to refugees by governments.”
– Kagan, Michael. 2005. “The Beleaguered Gatekeeper: Protection Challenges Posed by UNHCR Refugee Status Determination.” International Journal of Refugee Law 18(2).
“The capacity of UNHCR, its protection role and the standards it has been developing for the government-led RSD in the form of standard-setting materials, policy guidelines and training could indicate that the asylum seekers knocking on UNHCR’s doors could not be better off. However,…UNHCR’s RSD raises significant concerns: Compared to an individual national administrative act, which the decision taken within the RSD resembles, the procedural rights of the individual are everything else but satisfactory. The problems already occur in facilitating actual access to the procedure since no right exists on the part of the applicant and no legal duty on the part of UNHCR to enable him access to the procedure and to examine his application. Within the eligibility assessment procedure the applicant does not need to be provided with an interpreter or counsel, the decision can be taken on the basis of secret evidence and the level of discretion in allowing third parties to be present and to participate in the individual procedure is very high. The field officers deciding on the cases are also not obliged to provide the applicant with reasons for the decision. And finally, there is no proper legal remedy in its classical meaning that would enable the applicant to invoke his substantial and procedural rights after the decision has been issued. Further critical points regarding this UNHCR activity highlighted in the literature and by practitioners include questions relating to the competence of UNHCR to decide individual applications, enforcement and effect of such decisions, accountability and questions of legitimacy with regard to the problem-solving potential of such decisions. Doubts as to the fairness of the procedure were also confirmed by the European Court of Human Rights (ECourtHR) and deficiencies have been recognized by the UNHCR itself.”
– Smrkolj, Maja. 2010. “International Institutions and Individualized Decision-making: An Example of UNHCR’s Refugee Status Determination” in ed. Armin von Bogdandy et al., The Exercise of Public Authority by International Institutions: Advancing International Institutional Law. Berlin: Springer, 165-193.
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UN General Assembly, Statute of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 14 December 1950, A/RES/428(V), available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3628.html [accessed 25 August 2013].
UN High Commissioner for Refugees, A Thematic Compilation of Executive Committee Conclusions, 6th edition, June 2011, June 2011, available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/4f50cfbb2.html [accessed 26 August 2013].
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Bianchini, Kate. 2010. “The Mandate Refugee Program: a Critical Discussion.” International Journal of Refugee Law 22 (3): 367-378.
Kagan, Michael. 2006. “Frontier Justice: Legal Aid and UNHCR Refugee Status Determination in Egypt.”Journal of Refugee Studies 19 (1):45-68.
Kagan, Michael. 2005. “The Beleaguered Gatekeeper: Protection Challenges Posed by UNHCR Refugee Status Determination.” International Journal of Refugee Law 18(2).
RSDWatch.org. 2006. “No Margin for Error: Implementation of UNHCR’s Procedural Standards for refugee status determination at selected UNHCR field offices in 2006.” Available at: http://www.rsdwatch.org/index_files/Page397.htm.
Smrkolj, Maja. 2010. “International Institutions and Individualized Decision-making: An Example of UNHCR’s Refugee Status Determination” in ed. Armin von Bogdandy et al., The Exercise of Public Authority by International Institutions: Advancing International Institutional Law. Berlin: Springer, 165-193.
Zieck, Marjoleine. 2010. UNHCR’s Parallel Universe: Marking the Contours of a Problem. Amsterdam: University of Amsterdam Press.
Zieck, Marjoleine. 2006. UNHCR’s Worldwide Presence in the Field: A Legal Analysis of UNHCR’s Cooperation Agreements. Amsterdam: Wolf Legal Publishers.
Zieck, Marjoleine. 2010. “UNHCR and Turkey, and Beyond: of Parallel Tracks and Symptomatic Cracks.” International Journal of Refugee Law 22(4): 593-622.