Forced internal displacement : pattern, health impacts and policy response

Internal displacement is one form of forced migration. Forced migration refers to a situation where people or the community is displaced or forced to flee or leave their home or usual place of residence as a result of human-made (e.g. civil strife, armed conflict, generalised violence or human rights violations) and natural or environmental (e.g. volcanic eruption, flooding, hurricanes, earthquakes, cyclone, drought, infectious disease such as Ebola, deforestation, and chemical or nuclear disasters) disasters, large-scale development projects (e.g. extraction of mineral resources such as mining or oil extraction, construction of dam, airport or roads, military installations or conservation projects), and slavery and human trafficking (e.g. smuggling people for economic gain) (United Nations Commission on Human Rights, 1993). If the displaced people do not cross international borders they are known as internally displaced persons (IDPs), and if they cross international borders and their application for a legal status under the Refugee Convention is approved, they are considered refugees. However, if their application for a legal status cannot be substantiated or has not yet been determined, they are known as asylum seekers. In this chapter, we only focus on IDPs. Issues related to refugees are addressed in Chapter 3, while issues related to asylum seekers are addressed in Chapter 6. We start by summarising the current pattern of IDPs.