Central America and CIREFCA

Internal conflicts in Central America during the late 1970s and the 1980s perpetuated endemic violence and brutal counter-insurgency campaigns throughout the region, which in turn generated large numbers of internally displaced people and vast outpourings of refugees throughout Central and North America.  As the Cold War wound down in the late 1980s, an International Conference on Central American Refugees (CIREFCA) was called to facilitate a Concerted Plan of Action to address displacement in the region. At the heart of CIREFCA was the conviction that a successful resolution of the region’s conflicts would involve not only the end of the various conflicts but also large-scale assistance in the wake of the widespread social and economic disruption that the wars had produced, including the displacement of people.

Lasting until 1994, and set within the wider context of the regional peace process, CIREFCA aimed to promote access to durable solutions for the region’s refugees and displaced.  The underlying ethos of CIREFCA was to find durable solutions for displacement through an integrated development approach, closing the ‘gap’ between relief and development to simultaneously address the needs of refugees, returnees, and the internally displaced, while also benefiting local communities. UNHCR and UNDP jointly ran a permanent secretariat for the initiative and provided regional states with technical support in developing their own priority projects.

The process involved the participation of countries of asylum and countries of origin in the region as well as donor governments and international organizations. CIREFCA is estimated to have channeled US $422.3 million in additional resources to the region.  Throughout the process, the most significant group of donors was the European states, motivated by their broader political and economic interests in the region.

In its immediate aftermath, CIREFCA was generally seen as a success in terms of enhancing refugees’ access to protection and durable solutions.  The process has also been widely credited with helping to consolidate peace in Central America.  CIREFCA’s success can be attributed to a number of features. First, CIREFCA was based upon a collaborative approach, involving a range of other UN actors. Rather than being conceived in isolation, CIREFCA was structurally connected to the wider peace and post-conflict reconstruction initiatives for the region. UNHCR also developed a well-defined partnership with UNDP in order to implement its integrated development approach to promoting self-reliance, local integration, and repatriation. Second, UNHCR provided political leadership and developed a sustained political process, helping to channel states’ wider interests into a commitment to refugee protection and durable solutions.

Recent research has been somewhat more critical of CIREFCA, particularly its long-term effects. Access to protection and support was highly uneven, with only a fraction of forced migrants benefitting from international assistance. Scores of displaced persons who embraced return and internal resettlement opportunities were exposed to violence and discrimination, and regional states remained resistant to the reforms that would have been necessary to enable the displaced to assume the status of full and equal rights-bearing citizens.

Credit: Gil Loescher

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Offline Resources

• Aguilar Zinse, A. (1991) 'CIREFCA: the promises and reality of the International Conference on Central American Refugees' Washington, D.C., Hemispheric Migration Project, Center for Immigration Policy and Refugee Assistance, Georgetown University.