Algeria Shrugs off Commitment To Respecting Refugee Rights

The continuous violations of international law turned Algeria into a solitary state, ludicrously opposing the Rabat Declaration on the Health of Refugees and Migrants, and acting outside the consensus of the international community, reported Spanish news website “Atalayar” on Wednesday.
The Declaration was initially accepted by Algeria, but then the country decided to be out of tune with the rest of the UN member states by making a reservation on the census of refugees hosted on its territory as an overriding principle of the protection of their rights.
The move itself is a violation of “jus cogens” i.e., a peremptory norm that is accepted by the international community of states as a norm from which no derogation is permitted.
The same newspaper noted that Algeria’s breaches of its international commitments are nothing new, given the repeated calls by the United Nations to promote and protect human rights in the North African country.
The United Nations has called on Algeria to conduct a headcount of the population held captive in the Tindouf camps over the suspicion that figures and indicators are inflated by the Algerian authorities.
The World Food Program (WFP) also voiced concern and doubts “about the sale and transfer of humanitarian assistance outside the camps and to other neighboring countries”.
According to UNHCR, over 170,000 Sahrawi refugees are dwelling in the Tindouf camps, where many have been living for over 40 years in the middle of the desert, under terrible climatic circumstances that make agricultural production impossible, forcing them to rely on humanitarian aid to survive.
With the facilitation of the Kingdom of Morocco, the “Rabat Declaration” was negotiated for several weeks in Geneva, prior to the Third Global Consultation on the Health of Refugees and Migrants, and was accepted by all parties concerned, including Algeria.