La Strada Documentation Center

Undocumented Migrants Have Rights! An Overview of the International Human Rights Framework

Document number
1303
Date
2007
Title
Undocumented Migrants Have Rights! An Overview of the International Human Rights Framework
Author/publisher
Luca Bicocchi, Michele LeVoy, Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM)
Availability
View/save PDF version of this document
Document type(s)
Research/Study/Analysis,
Keywords
Migrant rights; Migration management; Comprehensive approach to migration; Migration policy; Irregular Migration, Feminization of migration, Economic migration, Labour migration, Free movement, Undocumented migrants; Undocumented labour;
Summary
The human rights of undocumented migrants are articulated within a variety of instruments and treaties on both the international and regional levels. In order to give a clear picture of the different instruments that specifically relate to undocumented migrants, this overview is structured in two different parts. The first part presents instruments within the international human rights framework as well as those on the European level and clarifies why and how these instruments uphold the human rights of undocumented migrants. The second part enumerates more in detail all of the human rights that apply to undocumented migrants within the international and European conventions and relative articles therein. The purpose is to offer a big picture of that fragmentary universe that is called the “international migration regime,”1 and also to offer a useful tool that can be used by a wide range of actors to strengthen their knowledge about undocumented migrants’ human rights. The intended audience is both those interested in deepening their knowledge of the human rights of undocumented migrants within international human rights law, as well as those who are engaged in defending these rights on a daily basis. We thus hope that researchers, members of international organizations, NGOs, trade unions and government agencies, professionals from diverse fields, activists, as well as undocumented migrants themselves may find this a useful instrument for defending undocumented migrants’ human rights.
Related documents