Through the 1990s, Colombia's internal armed conflict gradually expanded to cover the entire country and, from the mid-1990s, to spill increasingly over into neighbouring countries. Forced displacement has dramatically increased as a result of violations of humanitarian law and human rights. Based on their political and security interests, the governments of Colombia and neighbouring countries, as well as other key actors, have constructed the reality of a conflict without an international dimension. Keen to prevent the Colombian conflict from becoming international, most neighbouring countries have denied the conflict's spill-over effects, particularly the steadily growing refugee flows, and adopted deterrent measures to protect their territories, through military operations along the border, the adoption of non-admission policies against refugees and the systematic deportation of Colombians entering irregularly. These practices breach the obligations owed by the neighbouring countries under the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol with respect to Articles 31, 32, 33 and 35. They also infringe commitments under the 1969 American Convention on Human Rights and disregard regional protection standards such as enshrined in the 1984 Cartagena Declaration on Refugees. The strategy of neighbouring countries has proven inadequate: not only have Colombia's irregular groups further expanded their operations into their territories, but an ever increasing number of refugees have managed to bypass border controls by hiding in remote areas or finding informal ways into society, as no fair refugee status determination exists. Estimates suggest that the number of Colombians who fled over the past five to seven years to Ecuador, Panama and Venezuela may range between 300 000 and 1 million. The vast majority lives under irregular migration status in constant fear of being returned to Colombia or attacked by Colombia's irregular groups and struggling to meet essential humanitarian needs. UNHCR has started to tackle the artificial reality that Colombia's conflict has only produced internal displacement by sharing with governments and NGOs international protection considerations regarding Colombian asylum-seekers and refugees, launching a survey in the border areas of Colombia's neighbouring countries and establishing registration systems. Once refugee flows have been made visible, a specific regional protection regime has to be agreed with the governments in the Andean region. The celebration of 20th anniversary of the Cartagena Declaration on Refugees may be an opportunity to revitalize the declaration, agree on specific guidelines for its implementation and apply them to refugee movements from Colombia. A major regional humanitarian conference, following the example of the 1984 Colloquium in Cartagena and the 1989 International Conference on Central American Refugees, could be a suitable forum for defining the scope of the refugee problem, elaborating a protection regime and adopting a humanitarian action plan. © Oxford University Press 2004; all rights reserved.

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World South America refugee Western Hemisphere immigrant population civil war human rights Andes humanitarian aid