Protection of Migrants

A/RES/63/184No PDF available

Who created this mandate?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 64bHuman rights questions, including alternative approaches for improving the effective enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms, published in 2009.

What other versions does this mandate have?

22 versions · 2000–2025

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/80/218

2025A/RES/80/218Protection of migrantsLatestCompare with previous version
2023A/RES/78/217Protection of migrantsCompare with previous version
2022A/RES/76/172Protection of migrantsCompare with previous version
2020A/RES/74/148Protection of migrantsCompare with previous version
2018A/RES/72/179Protection of migrantsCompare with previous version

Versions are identified automatically by matching titles within the same organ (~97% accuracy on a manual audit).

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

2 reports of the Secretary-General submitted under this mandate, 2009–2010.

2010A/65/156Promotion and protection of human rights, including ways and means to promote the human rights of migrants report of the Secretary-General
2009A/64/188Protection of migrants report of the Secretary-General

Identified automatically from the metadata in each report’s UN Digital Library catalogue record.

What does this mandate say?

26 operative paragraphs

Calls upon States to promote and protect effectively the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all migrants, regardless of their migration status, especially those of women and children, and to address international migration through international, regional or bilateral cooperation and dialogue and through a comprehensive and balanced approach, recognizing the roles and responsibilities of countries of origin, transit and destination in promoting and protecting the human rights of all migrants, and avoiding approaches that might aggravate their vulnerability;

Also calls upon States to ensure that their laws and policies, including in the areas of counter-terrorism and combating transnational organized crime such as trafficking in persons and smuggling of migrants, fully respect the human rights of migrants;

Calls upon States that have not done so to consider signing and ratifying or acceding to the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their FamiliesError: Reference source not found as a matter of priority, and requests the Secretary-General to continue his efforts to raise awareness of and promote the Convention;

Urges States parties to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and supplementing protocols thereto, namely, the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air and the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, to implement them fully, and calls upon States that have not done so to consider ratifying or acceding to them as a matter of priority;

Takes note of the report of the Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families on its seventh and eighth sessions;

Requests all States, international organizations and relevant stakeholders to take into account in their policies and initiatives on migration issues the global character of the migratory phenomenon and to give due consideration to international, regional and bilateral cooperation in this field, including by undertaking dialogues on migration that include countries of origin, destination and transit, as well as civil society, including migrants, with a view to addressing, in a comprehensive manner, inter alia, its causes and consequences and the challenge of undocumented or irregular migration, granting priority to the protection of the human rights of migrants;

Expresses concern about legislation and measures adopted by some States that may restrict the human rights and fundamental freedoms of migrants, and reaffirms that, when exercising their sovereign right to enact and implement migratory and border security measures, States have the duty to comply with their obligations under international law, including international human rights law, in order to ensure full respect for the human rights of migrants;

Takes note with appreciation of the measures adopted by some States to reduce detention periods for irregular migrants in the application of domestic regulations and laws regarding irregular migration;

Calls upon all States to respect the human rights and the inherent dignity of migrants and to put an end to arbitrary arrest and detention and, where necessary, to review detention periods in order to avoid excessive detention of irregular migrants, and to adopt, where applicable, alternative measures to detention;

Urges all States to adopt effective measures to prevent and punish any form of illegal deprivation of liberty of migrants by individuals or groups;

Requests States to adopt concrete measures to prevent the violation of the human rights of migrants while in transit, including in ports and airports and at borders and migration checkpoints, to train public officials who work in those facilities and in border areas to treat migrants respectfully and in accordance with the law, and to prosecute, in conformity with applicable law, any act of violation of the human rights of migrants, inter alia, arbitrary detention, torture and violations of the right to life, including extrajudicial executions, during their transit from their country of origin to the country of destination and vice versa, including their transit through national borders;

Recalls that the Universal Declaration of Human RightsError: Reference source not found recognizes that everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted to him or her;

Takes note with appreciation of the successful implementation by some States of alternative measures to detention in cases of undocumented migration as a practice that deserves consideration by all States;

Urges States to ensure that repatriation mechanisms allow for the identification and special protection of persons in vulnerable situations and take into account, in conformity with their international obligations and commitments, the principle of the best interest of the child and family reunification;

Underlines the right of migrants to return to their country of citizenship, and recalls that States must ensure that their returning nationals are duly received;

Reaffirms emphatically the duty of States parties to ensure full respect for and observance of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations,Error: Reference source not found in particular with regard to the right of all foreign nationals, regardless of their immigration status, to communicate with a consular official of the sending State in case of arrest, imprisonment, custody or detention, and the obligation of the receiving State to inform the foreign national without delay of his or her rights under the Convention;

Strongly condemns the manifestations and acts of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance against migrants and the stereotypes often applied to them, including on the basis of religion or belief, and urges States to apply and, where needed, reinforce the existing laws when xenophobic or intolerant acts, manifestations or expressions against migrants occur, in order to eradicate impunity for those who commit xenophobic and racist acts;

Requests all States, in conformity with national legislation and applicable international legal instruments to which they are party, to enforce labour law effectively, including by addressing violations of such law, with regard to migrant workers’ labour relations and working conditions, inter alia, those related to their remuneration and conditions of health, safety at work and the right to freedom of association;

Encourages all States to remove obstacles that may prevent the safe, unrestricted and expeditious transfer of remittances of migrants to their country of origin or to any other countries, in conformity with applicable legislation, and to consider, as appropriate, measures to solve other problems that may impede such transfers;

Welcomes immigration programmes, adopted by some countries, that allow migrants to integrate fully into the host countries, facilitate family reunification and promote a harmonious, tolerant and respectful environment, and encourages States to consider the possibility of adopting these types of programmes;

Requests Member States, the United Nations system, international organizations, civil society and all relevant stakeholders, especially the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants, to ensure that the perspective of the human rights of migrants is included among the priority issues in the ongoing discussions on international migration and development within the United Nations system, bearing in mind the discussions of the High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development held pursuant to General Assembly resolution 58/208 of 23 December 2003;

Invites the Chairperson of the Committee to address the General Assembly at its future sessions under the item entitled “Promotion and protection of human rights”;

Invites the Special Rapporteur to present his reports to the General Assembly at its future sessions under the item entitled “Promotion and protection of human rights”;

Invites Member States to strengthen their efforts to raise awareness of the important contribution of migrants to all spheres of society and to consider the development of appropriate tools to highlight the contribution of migrants to recipient countries, including through the collection of data and the development of statistics;

Requests the Secretary-General to provide the resources necessary, from within existing resources of the United Nations, for the Committee to meet for two separate sessions in 2009, the first session to be of two consecutive weeks’ duration and the second session to be of one week’s duration, for the purpose of meeting the demands of the workload arising from the increasing number of reports of States parties that have been submitted to the Committee, and invites the Committee to consider ways of further improving the effectiveness of its working sessions;

Also requests the Secretary-General to report on the implementation of the present resolution at its sixty-fourth session and to include in that report an analysis of the ways and means to promote the human rights of migrants, taking into account the views of the Special Rapporteur, and decides to examine the question further under the item entitled “Promotion and protection of human rights”.

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Protection of Migrants

Who created this mandate?

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What does this mandate say?

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