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Right of Return

The document summarizes Amnesty International's call on Turkish authorities to allow Turkish citizens of Kurdish origin who are refugees to return from Iraq's Mahmur camp without fear of harassment or discrimination. Over 20 refugees have already returned this week from the camp, which houses around 11,000 refugees who fled Turkey in the 1990s due to human rights abuses. Amnesty International urges Turkey to respect the refugees' right to return, ensure their dignified and voluntary reintegration, and restore their lost nationality or grant nationality to children born in other countries.

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44 views1 page

Right of Return

The document summarizes Amnesty International's call on Turkish authorities to allow Turkish citizens of Kurdish origin who are refugees to return from Iraq's Mahmur camp without fear of harassment or discrimination. Over 20 refugees have already returned this week from the camp, which houses around 11,000 refugees who fled Turkey in the 1990s due to human rights abuses. Amnesty International urges Turkey to respect the refugees' right to return, ensure their dignified and voluntary reintegration, and restore their lost nationality or grant nationality to children born in other countries.

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selestik
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© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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PRESS RELEASE

23 October 2009

Turkey: The right of refugees to return with dignity


Amnesty International calls on the Turkish authorities to allow Turkish citizens of Kurdish origin to
return without fear of harassment and discrimination as refugees begin to leave the Mahmur
camp in northern Iraq.

Twenty-six Turkish citizens of Kurdish origin returned to Turkey from the refugee camp in Iraq
earlier this week and many others are expected to follow.

The UN-administered Mahmur camp is currently home to some 11,000 refugees, who fled Turkey
during the 1990s to escape human rights abuses following armed clashes between the outlawed
Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) and the Turkish army.

Nearly half of the people living in the camp are children, many of whom were born following their
families’ flight from Turkey.

"Everyone has the right to leave any country, including their own, and to return of their own free
will. This right is guaranteed in conventions to which Turkey is a party,” said Andrew Gardner,
Amnesty International’s expert on Turkey.

“The Turkish authorities must not only guarantee the right, they must create the conditions so that
people and their families, some of whom may not have lived in Turkey at all, feel welcome. They
must be able to return with dignity.”

Amnesty International calls on the Turkish authorities to:


allow its nationals to return without any fear of harassment, discrimination, arbitrary detention
or prosecution on account of having left or remained outside the country;
create conditions conducive to the refugees’ voluntary return and reintegration;
respect the leading role of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in promoting, facilitating and
coordinating voluntary repatriation and ensure UNHCR’s direct and unhindered access to
all returning refugees in order to monitor their situation;
where refugees have lost their nationality, arrange for its restoration, as well as granting it to
children born outside the territory;
in the event of refugees wishing to visit Turkey to assess the conditions there in the context of
possible repatriation, facilitate such visits in cooperation with UNHCR, and the relevant
Iraqi authorities.

Background
The fundamental human right to return is enshrined in Article 13 (2) of the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights.
This right also forms part of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, to which Turkey is party.
International standards also fundamentally require that any returns must be voluntary in nature
based on a fully free and informed decision to return and facilitated to allow refugees to return in
safety and with dignity.

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