Don't miss your chance to join us for insightful discussions on displacement in Asia!
The 17th Human Rights in Asia Conference will examine how displacement disproportionately impacts marginalized groups—women, children, Indigenous communities, and LGBTQIA+ people—and explore how students can contribute to a better future. This student-led initiative, in collaboration with the University of Essex Human Rights Centre, provides a platform for academics and activists to exchange knowledge and propose recommendations for stronger human rights protections in displacement caused by conflict and the climate crisis.
Displacement in the context of conflict
The movement and mobility of one person from one place to another is a freedom that is recognised and protected under Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). However, displacement due to war, conflict, and climate crises challenges this right. Migration can be voluntary or forced, with the latter leading to displacement. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) defines displacement as the forced movement of individuals due to armed conflict, violence, human rights violations, or disasters. By the end of 2022, UNHCR reported over 108.4 million forcibly displaced people worldwide, including nearly 40 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Asia and the Pacific—many uprooted by Myanmar’s 2021 military coup. This figure does not yet account for the ongoing genocide in Palestine, where Amnesty International reports that 150,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from Rafah in Southern Gaza. Displacement is never a choice. Many resist leaving despite violence and oppression, as seen in West Papua, where communities fight to defend their land under Indonesian occupation.
Beyond the devastation caused by armed conflicts, the climate crisis is increasingly emerging as a powerful force driving displacement across Asia. The eight slow-onset effects of climate change, as identified by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), pose long-term threats that can push communities from their homes, either gradually or through cascading impacts that accelerate displacement. Desertification, glacial retreat, rising temperatures, land and forest degradation, biodiversity loss, ocean acidification, salinization, and sea level rise are reshaping the environmental landscape of the region. These processes can make vast areas uninhabitable by depleting vital resources such as water, arable land, and food sources, ultimately threatening livelihoods. As communities struggle to adapt, many are forced to relocate in search of survival. Moreover, these slow-onset changes heighten the risks of sudden extreme weather events like droughts, tsunamis, floods, and storms. When compounded with existing vulnerabilities, such disasters can accelerate displacement, forcing mass migrations both within and across borders. Low-lying coastal nations, densely populated delta regions, and communities reliant on fragile ecosystems are particularly at risk. In Asia, where many economies and populations depend on climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture and fisheries, the impacts of climate change are not just environmental but deeply social and economic. The erosion of traditional livelihoods and the loss of habitable land intensify the struggle for resources, leading to heightened competition, instability, and, in some cases, conflict. As a result, climate-induced displacement is not just a future threat—it is an ongoing reality reshaping communities and migration patterns across the continent.
Featured Speakers
Atty. Cecilia Jimenez-Damary is a distinguished international human rights and IHL lawyer with over 30 years of experience in human rights, torture prevention, transitional justice, and migration. She has worked with national and international NGOs, including in Geneva, where she contributed to the development of the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (OPCAT) and its adoption by the UN. Atty. Jimenez-Damary has also worked with the UN, the Norwegian Refugee Council, and as the UN Special Rapporteur on internally displaced persons from 2016 to 2022.
She returned to the Philippines in 2013, serving in various roles, including as the National Director for the Commission on Human Rights' IDP Project and as a government representative on the Transitional Justice and Reconciliation Commission for the Bangsamoro. Currently, Atty. Jimenez-Damary works as a Senior Professional Lecturer in De La Salle University in the Philippines, pioneering the first regular undergraduate transitional justice subject in the Philippine academe. In addition to undertaking other consultancies, she is also a Board Member of several NGOs reflecting her expertise: Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP); Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT); and the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS). She continues to provide capacity building support in the Philippine’s Muslim Mindanao, currently as IDP Adviser to the International Organisation for Migration peace-building project.
Atty. Jimenez-Damary holds several advanced degrees and was awarded the Distinguished Alumnus Award by Ateneo Law School in 2023 for her work in alternative lawyering.
Khin Ohmar is a Burmese human rights and democracy activist who has been advocating for justice since her involvement in the 1988 pro-democracy protests in Myanmar. Forced into exile after the military crackdown, she resettled in the United States, where she pursued her education and began working with international human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Refugees International. She co-founded the Women’s League of Burma and played a key role in various pro-democracy movements, including the Forum for Democracy in Burma and Burma Partnership, which later became Progressive Voice, where she now serves as Chairperson of the Advisory Board. Her work focuses on youth and women's leadership, peacebuilding, and human rights advocacy, and she has spoken at international forums such as the UN Human Rights Council. Recognized for her contributions, she has received multiple awards including a recipient of the Refugee Leader of Promise Award (Women's Commission on Refugee Women and Children; 1997).
Professor GS Gilbert is Sérgio Vieira de Mello Professor of International Human Rights & Humanitarian Law., Essex Law School & Human Rights Centre.
Professor Gilbert has worked with UNHCR for over 30 years, both in headquarters and in the field, covering all aspects of their mandate of providing international protection to refugees, asylum seekers, stateless persons and internally displaced persons.
He has partnered with the Global Protection Cluster that is working with 170 million people across 32 Protection Clusters. Essex hosted a symposium for the GPC on AGD in its Protection Cluster operations in March 2019 and was an expert at the Amman GPC Symposium on the voting rights of IDPs in 2018. He is currently engaged with UNHCR in including IDPs within its Rights Mapping Analysis Platform for every country on the planet.
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On 8 March 2025, we are also holding day one of our conference on Displacement in the context of the climate crisis at our Colchester campus.
