| dc.description.abstract | An estimated 25 million people today live in situations of internal displacement as a result of conflicts and human rights violations.' They forced to flee their homes because their lives are in danger but unlike refugees they do not cross international borders. Though exposed to violence and other human rights violations they have no or have only . limited access to food, employment, education and health care.
Large numbers of lOPs are caught in desperate situations amidst fighting or in remote or inaccessible areas cut off from international assistance. Others have been forced to live away from their homes for many years or decades because the conflicts that caused their displacement remain unsolved. However, while refugees are eligible to receive international protection and help under the 1951 Refugee Convention' and the 1977 Additional Protocol', the international community is not under the same legal obligation to protect and assist internally displaced persons.
National governments have the primary responsibility for the security and the well being of all displaced persons in ﾷtheir territory. Often, they are unable or unwilling to live up to this obligation. At the core of the lOPs problem therefore lie the fundamental and unresolved questions regarding the scope of the humanitarian action and the limitations of sovereignty. There is no clear legal framework for dealing with lOPs. Their Principal recourse for seeking legal protection and assistance remain with their governments.
This is so despite the fact that the best protection can only come from international law given the fact that most of the times the government that is given the primary responsibility to protect lOPs is the actual perpetrator of the atrocities leading to displacement. Today there are no specific provisions that assist in ameliorating the plight of the internally displaced persons It is in this context that this study looks at the plight of lOPs particularly in Kenya with a view to examine the extent to which the existing international legal and institutional framework protects lOPs This study looks at the plight of the internally displaced persons and analyses the problem that they face.
The study also looks at the existing international law instruments these being the human rights
regime, the refugee law regime and the humanitarian law regime, which as an incidental issue may be said to apply to lOPs. To be considered also will be the issue of lOPs in Kenya. | en_US |
