I. Executive SummaryAs of the last quarter of 2007, the Iraqi displacement crisis shows no signs of abating. Faced with insecurity at unprecedented levels, tens of thousands of Iraqis continue to leave their homes each month. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that more than 2 million people are now displaced inside Iraq, while another 2.2 million Iraqi nationals have sought safety in countries in the region. The vast majority of those Iraqis who have fled abroad have gone to Syria, which hosts an estimated 1.4 million Iraqi refugees, and to Jordan, which is estimated to host up to 750,000 Iraqi refugees. Compared to Syria and Jordan, Lebanon hosts a relatively small number of Iraqi refugees, estimated at around 50,000. But Lebanon, with a population of only four million people, already shoulders a significant burden by hosting 250,000 to 300,000 Palestinian refugees. Political instability and crisis also make many Lebanese wary of hosting another refugee population whose prospects of returning to their home country in the short term are remote. The situation is further complicated because many Lebanese perceive that the sectarian tensions that plague Iraqi society might feed into, and amplify, the sectarian tensions that are ever present in Lebanon itself. Iraqi refugees in Lebanon currently enjoy only very limited protection. Since January 2007, UNHCR grants refugee status on a prima facie basis to all Iraqi nationals from central and southern Iraq who have sought asylum in Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Turkey, and Lebanon. However, Lebanon, like some of its neighbors, does not give legal effect to UNHCR’s recognition of Iraqi refugees. Lebanon is not a party to the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (Refugee Convention) or to the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. It has no domestic refugee law. Instead, people who enter Lebanon illegally for the purpose of seeking refuge from persecution, or who enter legally but then overstay their visas for the same purpose, are treated as illegal immigrants and are subject to arrest, imprisonment, fines, and deportation. The Lebanese authorities have in many ways shown a remarkable tolerance for the Iraqi presence in Lebanon. The police and the Internal Security Forces (ISF) do not systematically arrest Iraqi refugees who do not have valid visas or residence permits, but sufficiently large numbers of Iraqis are arrested and detained to ensure that the risk of arrest is constantly on their minds. The number of Iraqi refugees arrested increases in direct proportion to the number of checkpoints in Lebanon. While in March 2007 there were fewer than 100 Iraqi refugees in detention in Lebanon, by August 2007 this number had increased dramatically to 480 as a direct result of the proliferation of checkpoints due to the worsening security situation. As this paper goes to press, in November 2007, about 580 Iraqi refugees are in detention in Lebanon. This means that most Iraqis do not leave their homes unless absolutely necessary, and often do not approach UNHCR or the authorities for fear of exposing themselves to arrest. Their lack of legal status in Lebanon also means that they are vulnerable to abuse and exploitation by employers and others who know that the Iraqis have no recourse to the Lebanese authorities. Under article 32 of Lebanon’s 1962 Law of Entry and Exit, foreigners who enter Lebanon illegally are liable to a prison sentence of between one month and three years, a fine, and deportation. Iraqi refugees who are arrested and subsequently convicted of illegal entry are usually sentenced to the minimum prison sentence of one month, plus a fine and deportation. Once Iraqis have served their prison sentence for being in the country illegally, the Directorate General of General Security (General Security) under the authority of the Ministry of Interior assumes responsibility for them. In theory, General Security does not enforce deportation orders against any Iraqis, in accordance with Lebanon’s obligations under international law not to subject them to refoulement, the forcible return to a territory where their life or freedom would be threatened. In practice, however, the situation is considerably less clear-cut. General Security generally refuses to release Iraqi refugees who have served their prison sentence for illegal entry, and keeps them in indefinite detention. These Iraqis have very limited options to get out of detention. UNHCR is able to win the release of a small number; another relatively small group manages to legalize their presence in Lebanon by obtaining work permits; the majority, however, can only secure their release from prison by agreeing to return to Iraq. Iraqi refugees in detention are thus presented with a repugnant choice: either they continue to suffer indefinite detention or they agree to go back to the country from which they fled. For most, it is a choice that does not deserve the name. The notion of remaining in detention indefinitely is so abhorrent, and the conditions in prison so unbearable, that what is presented as a choice is not truly a voluntary decision but rather the only way of escaping an intolerable situation. In May 2007, Human Rights Watch interviewed an Iraqi detainee at Roumieh prison within moments of his “choosing” to return to Iraq. Until then, he had opted to remain in indefinite detention after completing his sentence for illegal entry. A few minutes before Human Rights Watch talked with him, an Iraqi embassy delegation had interviewed and processed him for return. He was so agitated and angry that he could hardly speak. He held up his thumb, still covered in blue ink, which he had used to produce a fingerprint, and said, “You see this? I’m going back! This prison is making me go mad. I will probably get killed in Iraq [he ran his finger across his throat], but I’m going back, I can’t stay in this prison any longer.” Thus, while Lebanon formally does not return any Iraqi refugees to Iraq against their will, it coerces many Iraqi refugees to “choose” to return to Iraq. By detaining Iraqis who enter the country illegally for the purpose of seeking asylum, and then giving them a “choice” between returning to Iraq or remaining in indefinite detention, Lebanon in practice commits refoulement. For the majority of the Iraqi refugees, both in Lebanon and elsewhere in the region, the only truly durable solution will be voluntary repatriation to a safe and stable Iraq. But in the absence of significant political progress in Iraq, this will remain a long-term objective. Meanwhile, the international community needs to acknowledge the concerns of Lebanon and other refugee-hosting countries about the long-term nature of the Iraqi refugee crisis and address these concerns by providing meaningful assistance to governments, local and international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and to international relief efforts, including through the United Nations. Countries outside the region must also offer to resettle significant numbers of the most vulnerable Iraqi refugees to relieve the burden on refugee-hosting countries in the Middle East and to help persuade them to continue to offer protection to the Iraqi refugees in their territories and at their borders. A September 2003 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Lebanon’s General Security and UNHCR is built on the assumption that Lebanon is not a country of permanent refuge and that UNHCR must find resettlement places elsewhere for the refugees that it recognizes. The MOU provides for General Security to issue “circulation permits” to asylum seekers and refugees for a maximum period of 12 months, during which time UNHCR undertakes to resettle to third countries the people it recognizes as refugees. Asylum seekers and refugees who hold circulation permits are exempt from arrest and detention for being in the country illegally. However, UNHCR cannot guarantee resettlement for all of the estimated 50,000 Iraqi refugees within 12 months of their registration, as it would be required to do if it registered them under the MOU. Therefore, while UNHCR recognizes all Iraqi nationals from central and southern Iraq on a prima facie basis, it does not, as a rule, register them under the MOU. As a consequence, UNHCR does not apply to General Security for circulation permits for Iraqi refugees. Instead, UNHCR issues Iraqi nationals from central and southern Iraq with refugee certificates. These certificates do not have the same status under Lebanese law as the circulation permits that the General Security issues to refugees. In particular, the Lebanese authorities do not recognize the certificates as exempting the holders from penalties for their illegal entry or presence in the country. Lebanon needs to adopt a different approach and offer Iraqi refugees the protection they need. The Lebanese government and its people cannot now simply wish them away. Denying them their rights does nothing to resolve the Iraqi refugee crisis, while doing harm to people who fled the country in fear for their lives. As one refugee who now finds himself in detention said, “It is not as if we are happy leaving Iraq. We cannot stay in Iraq because of the situation, the terrorism.” Lebanon should accede to the Refugee Convention and Protocol and adopt a domestic refugee law. At a minimum, Lebanon should delink its willingness to provide temporary asylum from the requirement that UNHCR guarantee to resettle refugees in a third country. The authorities should issue circulation permits to all individuals whom UNHCR registers as refugees, including Iraqis. Consistent with the international refugee law principle not to penalize refugees for their illegal entry or presence, Lebanon should not prosecute and punish Iraqi refugees for their illegal entry or presence by imposing fines and prison sentences. In addition, Lebanon should cease subjecting Iraqi refugees to indefinite detention after they have served their prison sentences for entering the country illegally. Indefinite detention of asylum seekers can constitute arbitrary detention, and the indefinite detention of Iraqi refugees in Lebanon is such an instance. Hence, Lebanon’s arbitrary detention of Iraqi refugees constitutes a violation of Lebanon’s obligations as a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and may also be a violation of the UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (Convention Against Torture). Until recently, Iraqi detainees who opted to return to Iraq did so in one of two ways. Either they made their own travel arrangements at their own expense or the International Organization for Migration (IOM) repatriated them. IOM, a Geneva-based intergovernmental organization comprising 120 member states, is governed by a constitution that bars facilitating deportations and requires that any returns facilitated by the organization be voluntary, a standard IOM defines as a choice free from pressure or coercion. For Iraqi refugees, their only alternative to returning to Iraq–indefinite detention–does not satisfy these requirements. As this report was going to press, IOM suspended its involvement in the repatriation of Iraqis in detention in Lebanon, but told the Iraqi embassy in Beirut that it would resume its assistance “in the near future after the UNHCR, according to their agreement with the Lebanese government, assesses the care for the expected returnees outside the arresting agencies.” This report will show that Iraqi detainees, far from having had the freedom to choose in the absence of any form of pressure, have been coerced by the prospect of indefinite detention to accept return to Iraq. This has rendered the distinction between voluntary repatriation and forced return meaningless. Human Rights Watch welcomes IOM’s temporary suspension of its involvement in repatriating detained Iraqis, and urges it to make permanent the reversal of a policy that had facilitated what were de facto deportations and that risked complicity in committing refoulement. UNHCR’s current advisory states, “No Iraqi from Southern or Central Iraq should be forcibly returned to Iraq until such time as there is substantial improvement in the security and human rights situation in the country.” IOM should not resume its involvement in the repatriation of detained Iraqi refugees from Lebanon, for these have been forcible returns in all but name. Lebanon’s refusal to legalize the stay of Iraqi refugees affects not just the relatively small number of Iraqi refugees who are arrested and detained, but all Iraqi refugees in its territory. Without legal status in Lebanon, Iraqi refugees are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse by employers and landlords who act in the knowledge that Iraqis have no recourse to the Lebanese authorities when their rights are violated. Moreover, the constant fear of being arrested and detained forces Iraqi refugees to adopt coping mechanisms that have further undesirable consequences. For example, since children are less likely to be detained than their fathers, some Iraqi refugee families opt to send their children out to work to provide for the family instead of sending them to school. Even if Lebanon is not inclined to offer Iraqi refugees the possibility of local integration as a durable solution to their plight, it should respect refugees’ basic human rights for the duration of their stay in Lebanon. In particular, it should offer Iraqi refugees at least a temporary legal status, and should give Iraqi refugees renewable work permits until they can go back to Iraq. Legal residency status could be made conditional on the security situation in Iraq, allowing Lebanon to withdraw permission to reside once Iraqi nationals can return to Iraq in safety and dignity. Until then, Lebanon needs to allow Iraqi refugees to live safely and with dignity in its territory. At the same time, Lebanon should not be expected to shoulder the burden of hosting a significant number of Iraqi refugees by itself. As is the case for other countries in the Middle East, particularly Syria and Jordan, Lebanon finds itself in the position of a refugee-hosting country for no other reason than the accidental circumstance of its geographical location. Lebanon played no role in creating the Iraqi refugee crisis, and has no more responsibility than any other country to solve it. In recognition of this fact, the international community needs to provide meaningful assistance to Lebanon and other refugee-hosting countries in the region with the ultimate aim of alleviating the plight of the more than 2 million Iraqi people who have been forced to flee their country. |