Conflict, health emergencies, and disasters in Somalia: What role can the 1951 Refugee Convention play?

This chapter engages with Somali displacement and outlines three of the never-ending crises that are persistently affecting the country – these being conflicts, health emergencies, and disasters – which have compelled Somalis to seek protection in neighboring countries. This contribution explores the attitudes of African countries in addressing Somali cross-border displacement, and particularly highlights the different approaches undertaken by Kenya and Ethiopia. It investigates what protection statuses have been provided in receiving African countries and the relevance of, respectively, international refugee law and African asylum law. Given that the prominence of the latter seems to be linked to a misinterpretation of the 1951 Refugee Convention, the Chapter concludes by evaluating the role that it could play in addressing the compounded impact of Somalia’s never-ending crises if applied in a principled way.