12 August 2006

Migration-related treaties and databases

A High-Level Dialogue on international migration and development will take place at UN Headquarters on 14 and 15 September 2006. To promote greater state ratification of migration-related conventions, a Treaty Event - "Focus 2006: Crossing Borders" - has been scheduled in parallel, from the 13th to the 15th of September. The treaties to be highlighted cover human rights, trafficking, refugees and stateless persons, organized crime, corruption as well as environmental and disarmament issues. Summaries of the treaties are provided in this compilation. More information is available through the Treaty Section of the UN Office of Legal Affairs.

The International Migration Law and Legal Affairs section of IOM has produced a legal database housing international and regional treaty texts as well as national legislation and bilateral agreements. Users can retrieve texts by subject category and by keyword. Note that as of this writing, very few national laws are included in the database. Most are from European countries.

Compare this tool with the International Legal Search Engine. This resource allows users to not only search for the texts of relevant treaties, but also to extract relevant articles of conventions that relate to particular topics or issues of interest. Users can also locate all conventions that have been ratified by a particular country.

UNHCR has a strong treaty collection and has provided access to a series of legal databases for many years: RefInt (refugee-related international and regional instruments), RefLeg (national legislation) and RefPol (refugee-related policy documents).

Posted in Web Sites/Tools.

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