UNHCR Protection Manual - Related sources

This paper's overall purpose is to identify the current gaps in protection mechanisms for trafficked persons, particularly trafficked children, as well as ways to address these lacunae. The study provides background research and information on three connected issues: i) the protection challenges that arise out of existing state mechanisms for identifying trafficked persons; ii) the establishment of a national referral system that guarantees assessment of the needs for international protection of persons identified as trafficked (including their entitlement to protection against refoulement under international refugee and/or human rights law); and iii) procedures adopted to address the special protection needs of trafficked children.

This paper talks about UNHCR's engagement in broader migration discourse and asylum-migration nexus. It concludes that UNHCR is currently engaged in a difficult balancing act. On one hand, the organization recognizes the need to underline the distinctive status, rights and obligations of refugees, and is sensitive to charges that it wishes to extend its mandate to broader migration issues that lie beyond its legitimate concern. At the same time, UNHCR is aware that human mobility is growing in scope, scale and complexity, and acknowledges that other stakeholders, especially states, increasingly regard the movement of refugees, asylum seekers and irregular migrants as part of a single (and often unwanted) phenomenon.

This paper will examine asylum applications by trafficked persons and those in fear of being trafficked, in four English-speaking trafficking receiving countries, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States, in conjunction with the UNHCR Trafficking Guidelines. It will also compare pertinent case law among the four countries.