Paula Gaviria Betancur, Special Rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons - Press Conference

Okay, I guess we're ready to begin. Good afternoon and welcome to this press conference. We have with us Ms. Paula Gaviiria Betancourt, UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons. She just presented her report to the General Assembly's Third Committee this morning. So without further ado, please, we'll have some brief introduction from special rapporteur, and then we'll take questions.

Okay, thank you very much. Good afternoon to everyone. Thank you for your interest in this important issue, I believe. So, as you were saying, I presented my latest report to the General Assembly, and this report examines the question, "Hai?" which I think is increasingly urgent in many contexts, and it's framed as, can reconstruction help end displacement, or can it entrench it? I think it went off, the sound. So today, we know that there are more than 82 million people that are internally displaced. This means that they are in their own countries, that they haven't crossed their borders. And they are displaced by conflict, by disasters, by violence. by the increased effects of the climate change and the aftermath of all of these drivers. And behind this staggering figure, there are millions of individuals, families, communities that have lost their homes, their livelihoods, their social connections, networks, and often their sense of belonging and their confidence and the trust in their institutions, and in the future, mainly. So there is profound impacts and human suffering that, thanks to you, journalists and the press, we have been able to see in the rest of the world. And at the same time, global reconstruction needs have reached unprecedented levels. So I decided to write a report on how we can, I would say, seize the opportunities of all these resources that have been invested in rebuilding and reconstructing, basically, societies. So more than $71 billion US are being how do you say in English? like evaluated for reconstructing Gaza, 11 billion for Lebanon, 216 billion for the Syrian Arab Republic, and some almost 600 billion in Ukraine. So this looks at the enormous investments needed. And we know enormous also needs exist in Sudan, in South Sudan, in Yemen, and in many other affected countries across the globe. So there is a huge economic cost. And most of these assessments also include the loss and the recovery costs. And I'm sure that these assessments are undervalued for the real costs. and the continued economic investment that will need to rebuild societies. So as governments and international partners mobilize resources on a holistic scale, some essential questions arise. So what kind of reconstruction are we pursuing? For whom? And who gets to shape these processes? If reconstruction is understood simply as rebuilding damaged homes and infrastructure, we will miss a critical opportunity. Reconstruction is much, uh, is, is about much more than bricks and mortar. Uh, for, for the report, this is crucial. It is crucially about restoring rights. It's about rebuilding institution and public trust in those institutions. It's about strengthening social cohesion and creating the conditions for displaced people to move beyond displacement and achieve durable solutions. So the real measure of success, and I was asked about this question in the dialogue this morning, what is the real measure of success, is not how many buildings are restored or how many roads are restored, the real measure is whether internally displaced persons can return voluntarily, safely, and live with dignity, or whether they are able to integrate also locally or settle elsewhere if they choose to do so, whether they can recover their housing, their land, their property, whether they can access decent jobs, services, opportunities, and whether they can participate in society without discrimination. So my report makes one point very clearly. Internally displaced persons must be placed at the center of reconstruction efforts. They are right holders and must be recognized as partners in driving the decisions that can so fundamentally shape their future. And too often, reconstruction processes move forward without meaningfully including displaced communities. And when that happens, there is a real risk that reconstruction will reinforce the inequalities, the patterns of exclusion, and the grievances that contributed to displacement in the first place. So I say in the report that there is another path for this. So if this reconstruction are guided by human rights and informed by the voices and the perspectives of internally displaced people, reconstruction can become a powerful tool for achieving durable solutions. It can help address the root causes of displacement. It can rebuild the trust between the communities and the institutions. And it can create more resilient, inclusive, and just societies where future displacement is less likely to occur. So in other words, reconstruction is not only about rebuilding what was destroyed. That's easy. It is about deciding what kind of society emerges from destruction. That is the choice facing governments, international organizations, development actors, and international financial institutions today. So that's why I'm here with you today. That's the report I presented. And I look forward to your questions. Thank you very much. That's a synthesis of the report, obviously. Thank you.

Thank you very much on behalf of the United Nations Correspondents Association for doing this briefing. My name is Edith Lederer from the Associated Press. A couple of questions. First, since the war in Gaza really has not ended yet and the war in Ukraine is still ongoing and getting more and more devastating, is any money actually being invested in reconstruction? And where do you expect these huge amounts of money to come from? I mean, almost $600 million in Ukraine, $171 million for Gaza, just to name a couple. And In terms of people who are displaced internally, do you see a bigger growth in IDPs than in refugees actually fleeing to other countries? Thank you.

Do I answer?

Yes.

Okay. So thank you very much for that question.

These are the estimates that have been made by different stakeholders for reconstruction in the different contexts, and the sources are in the report. I know that Ukraine has been committing to reconstruction since the invasion, I've been working very closely with IDPs in Ukraine and with ombudsperson in particular. And I would say that reconstruction planning in Ukraine is one of the most advanced globally for an active conflict, indeed, which is surprising. I don't know if you've been to Ukraine, but it's kind of like Yeah, it's the first time I went, I couldn't believe that you're simultaneously having to go to the basement, to the refuge, and at the same time, you're in a workshop thinking of strategies to rebuild a society. So they've been doing this through the Ukraine recovery conferences and, well, the other ones in the different countries, and they have generated major commitments and, well, you know the multilateral institutions, the EU, the G7, the but the destruction continues while the reconstruction goes forward. So it's never going to catch up. You're right. That's something that-- and I just spoke last week with the ombudsperson, and he told me that because the recent attacks, the numbers of IDPs are increasing again. They had decreased, and they're increasing again. So they are worried. But they have, for example, a new strategy for-- they renewed the strategy for displacement, and they are working very strategically on on housing, land, and property issues. They're working very strategically on income generation for families, on inclusion strategies. I mean, really, they do what they can with what they have. But I wouldn't have the answer for you. I mean, the answer for all the context is that the violence has to stop, the invasion has to stop, the occupation in Gaza has to stop. I mean, that's the first. answer and the first rule for any reconstruction effort. And obviously, prevention is the best investment. That's what I would answer. And we shouldn't be talking about reconstruction. We shouldn't be destroying ourselves, no, as humanity. But I would just answer that there. Yeah, and I would just say that at least what I've seen in Ukrainian IDP councils, it's a major commitment from Ukrainian displaced people to own their recovery process. They are major influential stakeholders in the recovery process. They are constantly advocating for more and improving the government's response, even though we all know that it's also the third country's responsibility, no? But they are doing what they can. And with Gaza, well, you know what us as special procedures have been saying about the importance of the role of that people from Gaza in owning their own process, that's a claim that they also have. And they should own their own future. And I think they're struggling. I've known that there's good examples of initial, locally owned, how do you say, process from civil society in Gaza, very low, how do you say this, with a lot of safety and protection, very low risk. Yeah, thank you. Because they need to be, but they're doing what they can with what they have, trying to own their own process, no? So that's what I call for here also in terms of the of the peace plan and everything. As mandate holders, when it started in 2025, we called for the ownership of the process by the Palestinians, and we just heard, I think, one month ago, two months ago, that there's a roadmap for this, the implementation of the reconstruction for Gaza. I haven't read it, so I mean, we need to look into it in more depth, but initially, I would say that there's much I mean, the Palestinian people need to own their future and their process, and the reconstruction there will only start when occupation ends. So that's what I can say in terms of your questions. And regarding refugees numbers, I mean, I can only say that in the overall figures from 2025-- we had 120 million people that were forcibly displaced in the world. 83 million of those were internally displaced. So someone that's good at math make the-- so the 40 million others are refugees. displaced, internally displaced persons are basically much more than the refugees. So the big question is, why do they receive less attention? And the answer is because it's hard for governments to recognize that this is happening in their own borders. I have to say, there's more than 40, I think now 42 countries that have IDP laws. So they recognize this is with sovereignty comes responsibility. I acknowledge this is happening. We have five countries in the world that have the highest numbers. One of those, my country, I come from Colombia. We have almost 8 million internally displaced persons. But we, you know about Sudan, 11 million. Afghanistan, 5 million maybe. Syria, I just came from Syria, 5 million. Ukraine, increasing the numbers. I think we're getting now again to the 5 million again. We had lower those, and we're going back to 5 million. And DRC, last year, it accounted for almost the third part of all the displaced last year. So this is an increasing issue. Last year's numbers showed that violence has become, again, the first driver of displacement. We also have disasters and climate change acceleration. And now what we have seen is that the protractiveness of the displacement, people remain displaced. You know, when people are displaced by disasters and climate change. They usually go back fast when the conditions are better, but they are remaining displaced because of violence, for example.

Just a quick follow-up. You said that violence has again become the first driver of displacement. What was it before?

Climate change and disasters in the 2024, for example.

Thank you so much for this briefing. As you noted, you recently went to Syria, I think it was in July. Did you meet the displaced Kurds who were displaced in 2018 from Afrin and more recently in January from some neighborhoods in Aleppo? What is preventing them from returning to their areas? What did they tell you? What is their biggest grievances? Thank you.

Thank you. I met with some of them in Afrin, so I met with some of the ones that had returned. So maybe I didn't meet with the others that haven't returned yet. So I can speak about the ones that had returned and why they don't feel that they have achieved solutions yet. So maybe that's what's preventing the others from returning. So So, you know, they are happy to be back in terms of they feel that that's home, no? But physical return, and that's a general principle, is not solution, no? They still feel that they lack livelihoods, no? They still feel that they need, that the roads, that the health services are there. And what you hear from the government is that they're working on it. And I think that's my general assessment. I think that the government is trying. The government has a vision of what they want to do with the inclusion of IDPs. My recommendation is that they need to understand that return is not only physical return. So your question is super important. Also, there's the integration of the Kurds in the constitution, transitional process, et cetera. They have questions about the, how do you say, like the, how culturally that integration is going to happen in terms of the language, in terms of the curriculum, the schools. So that's something that has to start happening, I think, gradually. But they are optimistic, I would say. They have a lot of recommendations. They want to have a seat in the conversations. They want to be listened to. But I think it's more an issue of livelihoods, an issue of the integrality of the response. I didn't feel issues of safety from what I spoke to them, you know, but I wouldn't speak for the rest of the people that haven't returned yet. I would just speak to the, about the, for the ones that I spoke to. That's my general assessment. Thank you.

Thank you so much. It's Pamela Fong from U.S. News & World Report. Thank you for the report, which I was checking where the report is, but it's, I think we found it. You found it, thanks. But I haven't read it thoroughly, but I did see in the initial part of the report that some of the numbers have, in fact, decreased in the past year. And I'm just wondering, you mentioned Sudan, a few other countries where people have been reintegrated, so it's not they're not IDPs. What how many different populations and in what areas of the world have people in longer-term conflicts sort of given up and left, and therefore they're not IDPs anymore? I mean, how much are you looking at that? I mean, there's refugees, there's IDPs. What about people who are IDPs and then say, it's been too long, I'm taking my family and leaving? I mean, if they can, obviously.

Okay, thank you. So yes, the numbers, there's an organization called IDMC. It's the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, if I get the acronym right. And they measure movements and people that are displaced. So they give those the final analysis every May, I think, from the past years. So there was a decrease of the general numbers from 24 to 25, I think. of around 1 million or something. I don't remember exactly, but I think I'll check in a minute to be more accurate. So we studied that a lot, and they themselves also studied it. And what they say and what we understood is that there's lack of registry because the type of also violence, for example, in the region that I come from, we have because of the type of violence, we have organized crime now, like a big perpetrator of those displacements. And that type of violence that they cause is a violence that creates a lot of uncertainty and that people don't denounce it. They don't go present themselves to the authorities. They want to make it pass like as an invisible thing. So there's like lack of registry of those type of displacements. No, it's like silence, no silence. We don't see anything, no one saw anything, we were not displaced, no. So, we think and they think that there could be. some of that in the decreasing. And also there is the impact of the funding, the funding data and registering that has been that's not lifesaving. So there's less funding for data. And so that's also that. And regarding you also mentioned the returns in Sudan. While we value that there's people that have gone back to their places of origin, we have also, and I think IOM issued a statement like one month ago or something about the safety of those returns, no? So they have to be looked at with a bit of carefulness because of the safety of those returns. And obviously, with the question from the colleague from Syria, maybe, or about Syria, how those returns can be solutions, you know? And so you asked the question about And I am very sensitive about this categorization. So there's countries that say that when people have returned, they are no longer IDPs. As much as I don't like the label, because people shouldn't be labeled, no? They are, I don't know, they are musicians, they are teachers, they are doctors, they are not IDPs, you know? Or they are not only IDPs, they are much more than that situation, no? The problem is that when they return, if you take them out of the list of IDPs, you feel that they have already achieved all the rights and that their needs are solved. So you just like, you forget about them. And they become the poorest of the poor. They are left totally behind, totally vulnerable. with no access to anything, they lost everything. What I saw in Syria in some places, I saw people that returned to their homes because there's this kind of like euphoria, this eagerness to go back and this dream of a better future for Syria. You feel that in Syria still after 2024. It's beautiful. So people go back to their homes, but their homes are totally destroyed because-- And so what they're doing is that they're living in a piece of their home, and they brought their tent with them. So they're living like-- they go and, I don't know, they cook inside the piece of home they have, and outside they sleep in the tent while they wait for that piece of home to be rebuilt or destroyed so their new home is built. So I mean, I wouldn't call those people that they are not IDPs. Because then I take them out of my investments, of my planning, of my everything. So the same with the Sudanese returnees. They are still IDPs until they achieve a solution. And achieving a solution means that you no longer have any needs related to your displacement. So that's what I would like to say. And there is a criteria for that in the UN. There's a framework. And then you asked about the continuity, no? And I shared my dialogue today with a special rapporteur on migrants. So I get that all the time, that people that are not protected in their countries, they might be IDPs, and they are, they don't find a solution in their country, so they just go to another country to try to find protection, and they become, depending on the protection status, they become refugees, or they become migrants, or, you know, so it's like a continuum also. Or what you're finding, at least in my region, after the migration policies in the U.S., they're returning, the inverse migration, the people that are coming back. when they don't find any solution in their own countries, they might be displaced, internally displaced. So it's like a continuum also of lack of protection and response. I'm talking too much. Please stop me. I talk too much. Sorry.

It's okay.

I think he had his hand first.

Oh, sorry. Okay.

But you're the one giving the floor, not me.

It's okay.

Thank you so much for the briefing. My name is Muna Aoutoul. I'm with Al Quds Al Arabi. First, we would like to start with the immediate situation in Gaza. People in the Strip are confined to roughly 30% of the territory. And on Monday, we were briefed by Mr. Carl Scal, the chief exec of WFP, and he said that the agency might need to reduce assistance to people in Gaza to half a million people in Gaza. So could you please tell us, if you can give us any information on how does your report, if your report is addressing these conditions, particularly how these conditions are affecting mothers and children in Gaza?

Yes, I've been engaging in Gaza since the 9th of October. after the first evacuation orders. And I spoke about the unlawfulness of those evacuation orders and joining other fellow special rapporteurs on different aspects. The most recent one, I think it was on the olive season in the West Bank. I don't know if you saw that one.

Yes, I've seen it.

Yeah. So yes, thank you for your question. And there's definitely references to Gaza in the report, but more related to the reconstruction of Gaza and the importance of the self-determination of the Palestinians in their own So there's a huge emphasis of that around that in the report.

Just a quick follow-up, since you just mentioned the focus is on reconstruction. Now we know that some researchers have described the destruction of the education system in Gaza as scholasticid. Does your report address education as another barrier to... reconstruction. And thank you.

Thank you. Yes, definitely. It's part of the, how do you say this? Yeah, the rights. I mean, if children cannot go back to their schools, it's not, It's not a solution for those families and for those children. It's not a proper future for those children. So there's reference, not directly mentioning Gaza in particular. In this report, we are not-- the aim of this report is not to refer to particular countries. I even get in trouble when I do. I had like-- I mentioned a country in the report. And there was like, on page 12, this page, you said something about my country, da, da, da. And I was only mentioning good things, because you're encouraged to mention good practices, et cetera, because it's not a country report. So what I'm mentioning, it's more in general. But it's also something that, for me as a special rapporteur working on this for many years, is very important. So definitely education, but I wanted to say something that is more related to education, but more related to mental health and psychosocial and emotional. health, I would say, which is super important for children. It's not only the issue of going back to school, it's the issue of being with other children in a safe space. It's the issue of sharing with others, growing with others, no, in a not in a tent, no? And it's what I call, like, the intangibles, no? It's the possibility of having, obviously, the maternal health for the babies. It's the to develop a dignified life where you feel that you're safe and you wake up every morning without the fear of not waking up the next morning or going to sleep. So yes, definitely it's written down. And I mean, even thinking of writing a next report, emphasizing these issues, because I think that intergenerational trauma that children that have only seen displacement-- and I think children in Gaza have only seen displacement since-- I mean, how many generations have only been displaced? Because now we have, I don't know, the 95% of the population of Gaza displaced. But this is not the first time. In these years, we have seen people displaced almost 10 times, 10 times. But these are people that have been displaced for how many years, how many generations, no? And the situation in the world, when you asked me the first question, the trend is that people remain displaced at least 10 years. So people are remaining displaced, not only in Gaza. People are remaining displaced at least for 10 years because they don't find solutions. for their displacement. They're people that are, like, forgotten by governments, you know? So yes, it's a very important question. Education, obviously, is part of what reconstruction should be looking at, and it's part of the report.

Thank you. My name is Stefano Vaccara, Italpress. I have two questions. One is, You said you confirmed to us that basically the internal displaced are much more than refugees.

In the numbers, yes.

In the numbers. Do you have any data on how many internal displaced would like not to be, of course, internally, they would like first option to go back home, they cannot go back home, would like to be refugees, sent to some other place, and They cannot-- why we have people that are able to leave a country, and why we have internally displaced people that would like to leave a country and they can't. My question specifically is, for example, in Afghanistan. I know that there is a Security Council resolution that was passed when the-- You know, when the Taliban got back in Kabul, the Security Council resolution basically was affirming that the new regime in Afghanistan had to let Afghani that wanted to leave, leave the country. And, you know, the members of United Nations will have to accept refugee, they will have to. So my question specifically, well, with more attention in Afghanistan, but in general, what is the opinion on why there are more internally displaced people than refugees? Because they want to be close to their home eventually, or because they can't leave the country? And that's the first. Then I have another one, and it's, if I read you these headlines, Human rights watchdogs are turning and turning on each other. And then I tell you that former UN torture rapporteur Alice Edwards accuses colleagues of neglecting Israeli victims, and she accuses other special rapporteurs. Do you think that this kind of, and then they actually have something to say. about her, that she's lying and so on. Do you think that that compromise, this kind of situation, could compromise your work and your credibility too, when you were trying to help the United Nations with this problem that you are focusing on?

Thank you. Okay, so the first question around the numbers and why... the IDPs, the internally displaced persons, figures are higher. I think one of the reasons is almost like practical. I think many of the internally displaced persons are very, very, very, very poor, many of them. And they just don't have the means to leave. That's what I have seen. They-- yeah, they come from-- many come from the rural areas. Many of them are-- live from agriculture. There's a lot of attachment to the land. Many come from Indigenous communities. or people that are, yeah, have a strong attachment to land, and they've moved to places, some of them, that they can continue or try to continue doing what they know how to do. There's other situations where there's, obviously, if you see in the in the composition of the families or the ages, you see that there's more older people or people with disabilities. Obviously, they tend to stay. I saw this in Ukraine. I visited many internally displaced persons, like camps or places where they stayed, and I spoke to many older women that they said that they were left alone because their sons, daughters, they left to other countries and they are waiting for them to come back, you know, but this happens more often than you might think. Yeah, so this is what I see. So journeys, when, at least in the, the Panama crossing, what we've seen in the New York Times, for example, for these migrants, or what you see in the Mediterranean. These are hard, hard trips. These are very risky and hard trips. And internally displaced persons, I mean, these are trips that are mostly done by younger population. So having said this, older people, if they leave, they tend to return sooner. They turn to have this sometimes romantic idea of their home and their land. I met with someone in Panama that she had left an island and she was like in a, she was from an island and she was in the continental. And she said, OK, I'm here, but I want to go back and die there. I don't care if-- I mean, this attachment to the land is so strong. So they want to go to where memories are, emotional ties, et cetera. And younger generations, they just are willing to start from scratch and to integrate locally, et cetera. The other issue is that 60%-- that's another report I presented here to the General Assembly last year, I think, it's that 60% of the 80 million are staying where they are displaced to. So they're staying in the cities. So this is also an urban phenomenon. So people are tending to stay in urbanized settings because they're thinking that they're not finding responses also in the rural areas. And regarding the The last question.

Just a quick follow-up on what you just said, but technically speaking for the UN, if somebody is running away from their home because, I don't know, it's being bombed, there are violence, somebody is trying to kill them, they are a refugee, so can be considered refugees only when they cross the border.

Yes.

Only when they cross the border?

Yes.

So the UN... in this case, will not consider anybody refugees on the way to be a refugee if he's not able to cross the border, right?

Correct.

Yes, they have to cross the border.

Could be that the explanation that there are more, more internal displaced people than refugee is not really because the most of the people of these internal They just want to be closer home. But it's because they cannot become refugees because they are not allowed or it's impossible most to cross the border.

It could be. And it's also expensive sometimes. It's expensive in terms of the cost that it implies. You have to pay people. And also, it's expensive in terms of the risk that you take. It could be that also. It could be that, too, yeah. It's true, yeah. Okay, so the last question is, it just recently happened. I was coming here and I saw the different exchanges. My, what do you say that, how do you call this? My best answer is that we have a code of conduct. So we are, we We are guided by that code of conduct, and I follow a code of conduct, and I know my fellow, the former one and the actual one follows it as well. What else can I say? I mean, obviously, every discussion impacts. We are already fragile, and we are being targeted, and So it obviously impacts us. But I also think that I believe so much in the work that we do. I mean, I can speak about, for example, my colleague today in the dialogue, migrant, S.R. Migrant. Everyone spoke so well of his report on children and family reunification, et cetera. my visit to CDA and the impact that that visit had. I mean, I see that we still play a role that is very important. And I wouldn't pay attention to getting caught up in those tensions. I would try not to get caught in those discussions. Because I think they don't contribute to this climate of confusion, I would say. I was just at lunch talking to other colleagues of how hard this work is. I'm not here to complain, because I do it with a lot of passion and commitment. But it's not easy to-- to do it in any case. And so, and as I say in other places, the attacks on us are attacks on the system, no, and on the multilateral system. So the criticism that targets people rather than our findings it's targeted to undermining their credibility, no? So, yeah, so I don't want to say anymore. Thank you.

I think with that, we'll close. I'll just say on that question that we do have a Commission Committee on Special Procedures where there is a lot of internal discussion because they work on many different which meets several times a year. which may or may not be discussing these issues as well very soon, two weeks here in New York. Yes. So with that, we will close this press conference. Thank you all for coming. Thank you, the Special Rapporteur, for everything and for your work.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.