Internal displacement in Pakistan: finding solutions

Pakistan should develop and implement coherent national policy aimed at protection of the most vulnerable.

With over a million internally displaced persons (IDPs), Pakistan ranks among the countries with the highest number of people forcibly uprooted from their homes. A cyclical occurrence of armed conflicts and environmental disasters has shaped internal movement in a fluid, sometime unpredictable manner, with people struck by one calamity leaving their homes at the same time as others elsewhere return, making it particularly difficult to plan responses and to protect the most vulnerable.

However, despite the availability of normative international frameworks like the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, Pakistan has a poor record in specific domestic legislation meeting international human rights protection standards.

So far, however, the Pakistani government has channelled its resources mainly towards assistance, with emergency responses in most cases overshadowing both preventive measures and most importantly, durable solutions. People uprooted by conflict in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Waziristan and the tribal areas and Balochistan, despite having received limited humanitarian assistance, have been in many cases unable to access protection mechanisms and make provincial and federal authorities accountable for their duty of protection.

IDPs from conflict-affected areas attempting to relocate in other regions like Sindh and Punjab, for example, are often met with suspicion and wariness by local populations and administrations. Persistently associated with poor, backward areas, while at the same time often perceived as inextricably linked to armed militant groups, the IDPs suffer from hatred and prejudice. Responses such as that of the Sindh cabinet, proposing to seal off regional borders for fear of a mass influx of IDPs following military operations in North Waziristan, while also setting up a specific police and intelligence cell to monitor the movement of IDPs and Afghan refugees, points to a worrying ‘securitisation’ of internal displacement issues.

Such institutional responses reinforce major concerns as to whether the Pakistani government, in planning military operations against militant hideouts, has put in place sustainable planning for the thousands of people who will eventually be displaced by conflict. Despite North Waziristan being affected by military operations and poor security, it has not yet been declared a conflict zone, leaving the fleeing population unable to register as IDPs. The duty upon the state to prevent causes leading to displacement seems lost in arbitrary scales of priorities.

Meanwhile, the same government should also consider that when engaging with the peace process with the TTP, it should make sure that the internally displaced are a part of such discussions. A line of action looking for realistic, durable solutions should involve all the parties involved in the conflict, and guarantee that armed groups are aware of their duties towards civilians in general and IDPs in particular. Although the Pakistani government is the principal responsible for the protection of uprooted populations, it should at least attempt to seek compliance on IDPs standards from armed groups involved in the peace process. When in July 2013, the chief of Lashkar-i-Islam Manghal Bagh asked IDPs from Bara to return to their homes, ensuring their security, he was taking on a responsibility that should have been first and foremost of the state; the Federally Administered Tribal Areas are an integral part of the Pakistani state and its citizens should be entitled to the same protection mechanisms as any other Pakistani citizen, not only to those provided by militant armed groups.

A realistic national plan for IDPs aiming at durable solutions should of course include the perspective of the displaced themselves. Although return is considered the preferred solution by governments, more attention should be given to local integration, since data shows that many displaced favour mixed settlement options, or to settle permanently away from home. In this framework, Pakistan has several challenges to overcome, with common obstacles to local integration including housing, livelihood and access to land and security of tenure. The latter is probably the most challenging, given that in the country, two per cent of the households own about 50 per cent of the land, leaving the majority of the population landless.

People displaced by environmental disasters, which in Pakistan have manifested in great magnitude in recent years, present an additional set of challenges, adding pressure to the three durable solutions of return, reintegration and resettlement. Returning to the place of origin is often simply not possible if the land has suffered irreversible damage or is still at risk of further disasters. In some circumstances, the costs of recovering land at risk of environmental calamities become prohibitive, making return simply unsustainable.

Durable solutions to internal displacement are to be understood as a process which requires both careful planning and long-term approaches. There is no doubt that Pakistan’s assistance capacity in terms of resources has been overloaded by an endless cycle of recurrent displacement crises — however, more could be done. The international community, too, has a considerable role to play that goes beyond reactively providing emergency/relief assistance to the IDPs. The main tool, which can be employed by third party states, is by promoting Pakistan’s compliance with international law, and pushing for the adoption of available instruments designed for protection and solutions to internal displacement. Pakistan should demonstrate political will through the development and implementation of a coherent national policy aimed at the protection of the most vulnerable segments of its population.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 22^nd, 2014.

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