Danish Refugee Council Lebanon

Briefing note on non-ID Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon May 2007

Introduction

Thousands of Palestinian refugees have been living in Lebanon for nearly 60 years in deprived and difficult conditions. These refugees fall into three groups. Around 404,170 refugees are registered with both the UNRWA1 Lebanon field office and the Lebanese authorities (these are termed ‘registered refugees’). Between 15,000 and 35,000 are registered only with the Lebanese authorities (‘non-registered refugees’). The third and most vulnerable group of Palestinian refugees is those who are registered neither with UNRWA nor with the Lebanese authorities (undocumented, or ‘non-ID refugees’). There are approximately 3,000 of these non-ID refugees in Lebanon2.

For many years lack of proper awareness about non-ID refugees led to their neglect and illegal residence in the country. As such, they are deprived of some of the most important and basic human rights. The following briefing note will describe the situation of non-ID refugees in Lebanon, including the problems they face, and provides recommendations towards the resolution of their illegal and problematic status within Lebanon.

Historical background: Why are there non-ID refugees in Lebanon?

The issue of undocumented or non-ID refugees was brought to light when Lebanon regained control over its territories at the end of the civil war. In 2001, a young Palestinian refugee from Ein el-Hilweh Palestinian camp was shot dead by a Lebanese army official as he tried to escape a checkpoint. He was holding a forged Lebanese identity card for Palestinian refugees and was afraid his situation would be discovered.

The vast majority of undocumented refugees arrived in Lebanon in the 1970’s and was predominantly single males. Reasons for their presence in Lebanon vary and include: - Some refugees left Palestine in 1948 and were registered by UNRWA in its other fields of operations (Gaza, West Bank, Jordan or Syria), but were exiled a second time mainly in 1967 or following subsequent Arab-Israeli wars. Their UNRWA files did not follow their relocation. - Some refugees came to Lebanon with the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). At the time of their arrival in the country, their legal situation was not an issue. With the departure of the PLO in 1982 they were left without protection. - Some were working or studying abroad when the Arab-Israeli conflict started and were denied return to their original homelands due to border changes.

Problems faced by undocumented refugees

In addition to the general problems faced by the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, non-ID refugees face the following difficulties: - Fear of moving outside the camps and around the country. Some refugees have not left the camps for years in fear of being arrested.

1 UNRWA is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and was established in 1949 following the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict. 2 Survey Report on the Situation of non-ID Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon, DRC, Beirut, 2005, available on: www.drc.dk.

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- Impossibility to travel and visit their families abroad due to either their lack of documents or because their documents have expired and can not be renewed. - Impossibility to officially register marriages, births and deaths. Non-ID refugees can marry at the confessional court, but can not register their marriage with the Lebanese authorities. A non-ID child is only entitled to a birth certificate signed by the ‘mokhtar’ (local mayor). - Limited access to education. Although non–ID refugees can access UNRWA schools, they often discontinue their education at age 15 because they can not sit the official ‘brevet’ exam. Frequently, they drop out before this stage as they are aware that they are unable to graduate. - Although access to the employment market is difficult for all Palestinian refugees, access to legal employment outside the camp for non-ID refugees is impossible. Only Palestinian refugees born in Lebanon and registered with the Lebanese authorities have access to legal employment3. - Added to the fact that, like other Palestinian refugees, they can not own immovable goods, non-ID refugees can not own anything requiring registration, such as cars or motorbikes. - Difficulty in accessing UNRWA services for refugees not registered in any UNRWA field of operations. Recently, UNRWA revised its guidelines to allow refugees registered in another field and women married to non-registered refugees to benefit from some UNRWA services. Refugees registered in another field can access primary health care, but access to hospitalisation is more difficult. Theoretically, refugees must undertake and pay for hospital procedures before presenting the official receipts for reimbursement. Reimbursements are dependent on approval from UNRWA in their field of registration. Often, refugees are unable to secure needed funds, up front, to cover their medical costs. Non-ID refugees have access to UNRWA shelter rehabilitation only if they are included in UNRWA special hardship cases program; this is the case for approximately 7 percent of cases.

Why the protection gap?

There are several reasons that contribute to the protection gap for non-ID refugees in Lebanon: - UNRWA considers that non-ID refugees fall outside its mandate; - Lebanon has no procedure for processing asylum seekers and is not a signatory to the 1951 ‘Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees’; - UNHCR4 has no mandate for Palestinian refugees; - The original country of non-ID refugees (Palestine) no longer exists therefore they can not be repatriated.

UNRWA is the United Nations agency, established in 1949, as a temporary agency to provide relief and works programs for Palestine refugees. The UN General Assembly has continually renewed its mandate. Non-ID refugees fall outside UNRWA’s mandate because they do not fit UNRWA’s definition of a Palestine refugee. UNRWA defines Palestine refugees as ‘persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, and who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict’. The definition has been extended to include the descendents of Palestine refugees. Therefore, Palestinians who fled after 1948, due to subsequent conflicts, do not fall under UNRWA’s mandate. In addition, UNRWA does not have a protection mandate, such that registered refugees who reside in a different field to their registration can not benefit from any protection given by the agency.

Lebanon is not a signatory of the 1951 convention relating to the status of refugees and consequently does not have an official asylum framework. A memorandum of understanding was signed in 2003

3 Decision number 14/1 issued on 8 March 2007 by the Minister of Labor, related to the professions exclusively reserved to Lebanese citizens, Official Gazette volume 16, 22 March 2007. 4 UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) is the UN mandated agency established in 1950 by the UN General Assembly to protect and assist refugees around the world.

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between the General Security (GS) and the UNHCR, under which UNHCR and GS share case files of refugees and if UNHCR grants refugee status they are obliged to find a country for resettlement. However, due to UNRWA’s presence in Lebanon, UNHCR’s mandate does not extend to the case of the Palestinians in the country.

UNHCR is the UN agency mandated to provide protection to asylum seekers who are recognised as refugees. UNHCR was established in 1950, after the creation of UNRWA. Both UNHCR statute5 and the 1951 UN Convention6, however, stipulate that a person receiving assistance or protection from another UN organ or agency is not entitled to UNHCR assistance/protection. Although paragraph 2 of article 1D7 of the Convention has been used to try to obtain non-ID refugees protection under the Convention, these attempts have been unsuccessful.

In a 2002 note on the applicability of article 1D to Palestinian refugees, UNHCR stated that ‘if the person concerned is inside UNRWA’s area of operations and is registered, or is eligible to be registered, with UNRWA, he or she should be considered as receiving protection or assistance within the sense of paragraph 1 of Article 1D, and hence is excluded from the benefits of the 1951 Convention and from the protection and assistance of UNHCR’. Specifically, the problem with regards to the protection from UNHCR is that Lebanon is a country where UNRWA operates. Furthermore, UNHCR’s Representative in Lebanon, Stéphane Jaquemet, when asked about the paragraph 2 of article 1D, referred to the travaux préparatoires of the UN convention, and stated that ‘the international community had precisely in mind to exclude the Palestinians in countries where UNRWA operates; UNHCR would play a role only if UNRWA stops operating, and not if UNRWA stops providing assistance to specific individuals’8.

UNHCR Geneva and Lebanon have both acknowledged that there is a protection gap for non-ID refugees living in Lebanon, especially refugees not registered in any of the UNRWA fields, and that some refugees are in need of international protection. In the opinion of Mr. Jaquemet, the most appropriate solution would be for UNRWA to extend its mandate to include non-ID refugees.

What solutions are there for undocumented refugees?

Non-ID refugees do not have legal status in Lebanon, but this does not infer that they are completely undocumented. Simplistically, it means that the documentation they possess is not sufficient to grant them legal stay in Lebanon. The majority of non-ID refugees have documents, such as expired or cancelled passports/travel documents, identity cards issued from other countries or UNRWA registration in another field that prove their identity.

Numerous solutions for non-ID refugees have been tabled and can be proposed to legalise their situation in Lebanon. Whilst some offer durable solutions, others are suggested as interim measures only.

Transfer of UNRWA files to Lebanon

5 Article 7 of UNHCR statute states: ‘…the competence of the High Commissioner…shall not extend to a person:…who continues to receive from other organs or agencies of the United Nations protection or assistance’. 6 Paragraph 1 of article 1D of the 1951 Convention states: ‘This convention shall not apply to persons who are at present receiving from organs or agencies of the Unites Nations other than the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees protection or assistance’. 7 ‘When such protection or assistance has ceased for any reason, without the position of such persons being definitively settled in accordance with the relevant resolutions adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations, these persons shall ipso facto be entitled to the benefits of this Convention’. 8 Interview with Danish Refugee Council on 18 January 2007.

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As many as 40% of non-ID refugees have a registration with UNRWA in another field of operations9. The transfer of the files from the original field of registration to Lebanon has been examined with UNRWA and with the previous host countries. Previous host countries have given their approvals for file transfers; however, the Lebanese authorities’ approval is needed to proceed with the transfer of files and has not yet been granted.

UNRWA has, however, recently agreed to allow refugees registered in another field to register their children under their UNRWA registration cards. Whilst this is not a formal legalisation of the refugees’ cases, it does provide the children a form of registration and allows them to benefit from some of the agency’s services.

Transmission of the mother’s status to her children

The vast majority of non-ID male refugees have married a registered Palestinian refugee woman or a Lebanese citizen. In Lebanon, the wife/mother can not transmit her status to her husband or children: If she is Lebanese she can not pass on her nationality, and if she is a registered Palestinian in Lebanon she can not pass on her registration. If a woman could hand on her status, the approximately 20% of women who are married to non-ID refugees would be able to claim citizenship for their children, and the approximately 48% of women who are registered refugees and married to non-ID persons could convey their registration status to their children. A provisional solution for the husband of a Lebanese woman would be to grant him a stay permit as the spouse of a Lebanese woman.

Re-issue/renewal of cancelled/expired documentation

Some non-ID refugees carry Jordanian passports or Egyptian travel documents. If re-issued or renewed, the holder of the document may be able to obtain a stay permit as a foreigner in Lebanon, whilst waiting for a permanent solution. Non-ID refugees might also be able to benefit from amnesties for aliens who entered the country illegally.

Egyptian authorities, via the Egyptian embassy in Lebanon, have agreed to renew expired Egyptian documentation.

The issue of stay permits is one interim solution for non-ID refugees. However, the annual fees for stay and work permits and associated fines are very high and not affordable to the majority of refugees. A more realistic solution would be to grant them refugee status in Lebanon or allow them the choice to return to their previous host country.

Registration with the Lebanese authorities

Registration with the Lebanese authorities, by which non-ID refugees would be classified as non- registered refugees, is the best solution for those non-ID refugees whose cases cannot benefit from any of the suggestions above.

What is being done currently?

The Lebanese government expressed its will in 2005 to improve the living conditions in the Palestinian camps in Lebanon. A government committee on Lebanese-Palestinian dialogue has been formed and improving the humanitarian conditions of Palestinians is an essential element of the dialogue. In a press conference held in March 2007, the chairman of the government committee, Ambassador Khalil Mekkawi, announced that the committee has started studying the case of the non- ID Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon, with the cooperation of the PLO office and UNRWA. He acknowledged the difficult economical, social and security conditions faced by non-ID refugees.

9 Statistics Report on non-ID Refugees Living in Lebanon, DRC, Beirut, May 2006.

Danish Refugee Council Lebanon

The Palestine Liberation Organisation re-opened an office in Beirut following a Council of Ministers decree in January 2006. Soon after, the PLO started issuing ‘identification certificates’ to the undocumented refugees displaced from the West Bank and Gaza and currently living in Lebanon. As of the end of April 2007, the PLO office had issued 2011 certificates. Whilst the certificate is a proof of Palestinian origins and is considered by the PLO as a temporary document, in practice it does not offer protection to refugees at Lebanese checkpoints, where they can still be arrested.

Non-governmental organisations are becoming increasingly active. Since 2005, the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) has provided legal aid and counseling in Tyre, the Beqaa, and most recently North Lebanon, and is advocating to raise awareness about the situation of non-ID refugees in Lebanon. DRC’s ongoing legal aid counseling explores legalisation options for non-ID refugees and has documented a caseload of 205 families (1067 persons). Most recently, in April 2007, a civil campaign was launched by a committee composed of 13 organisations working with the Palestinian community with the aim to assist and protect the undocumented Palestinian refugees in Lebanon.

Conclusion

Awareness about the situation of non-ID refugees has reached a wider audience than ever before. However, now that a third generation of non-ID refugees is starting to experience the hardships of life as undocumented persons, solutions must be found. The time has come to recognise and provide an identity, an existence and a future to the 3,000 people who currently have to fight to prove they exist and whose most serious concern is to provide a better future for their children. Considering the low number requiring legalisation, and the facts that they are currently living in Lebanon, their children were born here and they have so few options, a comprehensive solution, involving relevant authorities and key stakeholders (Jordanian, Egyptian, Palestinian, Syrian authorities, and UNRWA), can and should be found. In the absence of an overarching and comprehensive regional solution, however, individual governments and international agencies can and should support available interim solutions within their respective areas of authority and responsibility.

Prepared by:

Mireille Chiha Danish Refugee Council, Lebanon