DRC: Past. Present. Future? (Forced Migration Review 36)

New UNHCR research investigates the motivations for and challenges associated with the migration of young Afghans to Europe.

The desire to categorise all those seeking refuge throws up continuing challenges to traditions of hospitality and to the realisation of migrants' rights.

The Kampala Convention breaks new ground in elevating the right to be protected from arbitrary displacement to a binding legal norm.

When women migrants return, they can face daunting challenges to re-integration but can also contribute to development and transforming societies.

Displaced people in Colombia are resorting to mass demonstrations to persuade their government to assume its responsibilities towards them.

Central to Iraqi refugees' efforts to resolve the question of their immediate future is their access to good information about resettlement and return.

The most probable outcome of the 2011 referendum is that Southern Sudan secedes from the North, breaking Sudan into two independent nation states.

Parties to the protracted Congolese conflict have long promoted fear of 'the other' and a thirst for revenge; these attitudes must be addressed if peace is to have a chance.

After international agreements covering the return of refugees to Equateur and North Kivu, the challenge is to create local structures that can make the agreements work.

Durable returns of IDPs and refugees into some of the most densely populated areas in eastern DRC are never going to be a simple exercise.

Since independence, violent conflicts in eastern DRC have been linked to access to land, affirmation of ethnic identities and competition for political control.

The cascade training model has brought clinical training closer to the areas in DRC most in need of skilled staff to serve conflict-affected women experiencing complications in pregnancy and childbirth.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) combines its protection and assistance activities and focuses on 'priority zones' where armed actors are present.

Cash vouchers offer flexibility, enabling payment for school fees as well as for basic necessities. They also empower people who, in displacement, have been deprived of choice.

Effective provision of aid and protection for those displaced in eastern DRC requires reliable data which the new Data Centre in North Kivu is helping to provide.

Local organisations in Bandundu province located in western DRC are struggling to meet the needs of displaced persons in the absence of government or international assistance.

Donor engagement in DRC is more important than ever but donors need to reassess their strategies.

The UN integrated mission in DRC and the piloting of humanitarian reform there have been necessarily innovative in a challenging context.

Addressing the fate of children who are recruited into armed conflicts is not as simple as demanding their exclusion from those conflicts.

There is an increasing number of people who are being evicted from DRC's 'protected areas' both by the government and by international conservation organisations.

In preparing for a post conflict DRC, we should be more aware of young people's aspirations, the opportunities open to them, and the challenges they face in building a decent life.

Unmanaged resettlement of IDPs in eastern DRC might threaten an already fragile security situation.

A survey conducted by UNHCR in 2009 in IDP camps in North Kivu shows that access to land is the second factor after security which prevents people from returning to their zone of origin.

While there has been more focus on assistance to survivors of sexual violence after they have been attacked, not enough resources or political attention are devoted to preventing these acts of violence from occurring in the first place.

While service provision for survivors of sexual violence is the top priority, protection for women and girls can also be improved in DRC.

The sexual violence laws introduced in DRC in 2006 have had only limited impact. A much louder condemnation of rape and a far more proactive approach to prevention are urgently needed.

Internal displacement has plagued the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for nearly 20 years. This article provides an overview of the scale and causes of displacement.

Forced migration is not new to DRC but its extent and its consequences are still shocking. Good governance and research must play a stronger role if life is to improve for the citizens of DRC.

The conflict in eastern Congo has been the most deadly one since the second World War, and its social consequences have been disastrous. Solutions to the conflict must look to the long term.

While the crisis in the Kivus has been a focus of action and advocacy by the international community for decades, further conflicts have been proliferating in all four corners of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).