The basic rules on the refugee status are gathered in the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and the 1967 Additional Protocol, which do not mention the physical protection of refugees. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (hereinafter UNHCR) was established by the UN General Assembly with the mandate to internationaly protect refugees. Later the mandate has been de facto extended to the protection of internally displaced persons. Refugee camps are often a target of militarization which threatens the human rights of refugees and other people in the camp. Security threats can be internal or external. It is generally accepted that the host country has responsibility for acts on its territory, including in the refugee camp. However, the host country often has only de jure control of the refugee camp, de facto control is in the hands of the UNHCR. The UN International Law Commission has opened the possibility of shared responsibility among several actors in the Articles on the Responsibility of the States for Internationally Wrongfuly Acts (hereinafter ARSIWA) and in the Draft Articles on the Responsibility of International Organizations for international unlawful acts (hereinafter DARIO). The UNHCR is an international organization, in line with the definition in DARIO and has an independent legal personality which is limited by the mandate given by the UN General Assembly. The hypothesis of this master's thesis is that the UNHCR bears international responsibility for human rights violations in refugee camps. The first part of the master's thesis presents the basic concepts, including the concept of militarization and the principle of civil and humanitarian character of refugee camps. The central part deals with the analysis of the international legal framework of responsibility of the host country and the international organization or the UNHCR.
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