E/C.12/2017/1
United Nations
Economic and Social Council
Distr.: General
13 March 2017
Original: English
Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
Duties of States towards refugees and migrants under the
International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights
Statement by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights *
I. Introduction
1.
In the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants, adopted on 19 September
2016 following the high-level plenary meeting of the General Assembly on addressing
large movements of refugees and migrants, the Heads of State and Government and High
Representatives reaffirmed the human rights of all refugees and migrants, regardless of
status, and pledged to fully protect such rights. 1 They recalled that: “Though their treatment
is governed by separate legal frameworks, refugees and migrants have the same universal
human rights and fundamental freedoms.”2 The Heads of State and Government and High
Representatives pledged to move towards the adoption in 2018 of a global compact on
refugees and a global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration.
2.
As the international community is considering how to address the situation of people
fleeing conflict and persecution from war-ridden countries and how to answer the
challenges raised by migration flows, questions arise as to the range of economic, social
and cultural rights to which the people concerned should be entitled in the countries
through which they transit or in which they seek a safe haven and settle. Against that
background, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights wishes to recall the
guarantees provided by the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights.
II. Reception of refugees and migrants: immediate obligations
under the Covenant
3.
All people under the jurisdiction of the State concerned should enjoy Covenant
rights. That includes asylum seekers and refugees, as well as other migrants, even when
their situation in the country concerned is irregular. As regards refugees, the Convention
relating to the Status of Refugees and the Protocol to the Convention address a number of
* The present statement, which was adopted by the Committee at its sixtieth session, held from 20 to 24
1
2
February 2017, was prepared pursuant to the Committee’s practice on the adoption of statements (see
Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 2011, Supplement No. 2 (E/2011/22), chap. II,
sect. K).
General Assembly resolution 71/1, para. 5.
Ibid., para. 6.
GE.17-04000(E)