SLP 08 (2014)

officially recognized to adopt a more detailed legal regulation aimed at solving not only the consequence of, but also the reasons for, forced migration due to natural disasters: the International Law Commission has been working on a possible response to the issue. The Commission has been preparing the Draft Articles for the protection of persons in the event of disasters; the Draft Articles indicate a possible direction of proper international regulation of the response of states to the situation of persons who become victims of natural disasters. A closer look at the draft reveals that the regulation is to be primarily applicable to the providing of assistance on site, i.e. in places affected by the disaster; it fails to regulate the status of persons forced by such disaster to flee from these places due to unexpected natural events and to seek protection in other countries. The draft appears to anticipate certain unwillingness of states to become bound to a particular type of response to the influx of migrants arising due to natural disasters. Solutions of the situation of such persons seem to be envisaged particularly as ad hoc reaction of states surrounding the country affected by the disaster; however, any such solutions would definitely stand outside the scope of international (refugee) law. ͷ.͸ War refugees The second category of forced migrants which the authors have focused on is composed of so-called war refugees; these are persons forced to leave their country due to an armed conflict having erupted or continuing in that territory. It should be again noted that only a smaller portion of persons joining those migration streams may be defined as refugees in the sense of the definition under the Convention. Věra Honusková, in her chapter, suggests that the situation of migrants who flee their country due to war conflict instigating their fear for life, is left (under the general international law) to ad hoc support, which is primarily of a humanitarian nature and provided under the mandate of the UNHCR and/or some other states and organizations. There may be specific legal institutions found within the regional systems of regulation of refugee and migration law (Africa, the European Union, South America); these institutions facilitate the provision of protection for the time these persons cannot return to their homes due to safety reasons. Forms of such protection vary – they may be implemented as a result of regionally expanding the definition of a refugee (Africa, South America), or there may be autonomous institutions created for the purpose of providing protection to forced migrants due to an armed conflict (supplementary and temporary protection as stipulated in EU law). It is obvious that, unlike the practically unresolved position of environmental refugees, migrants fleeing (due to their fear for life) territories affected by war conflicts are covered by a certain, although only particular and regionally restricted, legal framework for their protection by states which is gradually developed. However, prospects of coordinated reaction by states at the global level in the sense of adopting a binding international convention regulating the status of these persons seems to be unclear and difficult to identify.

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