A two-day regional conference on refugee protection and
international migration in West Africa organized jointly by the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), IOM, the
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the
Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) opens on
Thursday in the Senegalese capital Dakar.

This conference, which will be officially opened by Senegal's
President Abdoulaye Wade, will bring together some 200 officials
from UN agencies, IOM, ECOWAS' fifteen Member States, donor
countries, and national and international NGOs to discuss issues
relating to refugee protection and international migration in West
Africa.

Participants will look at how the free movement of citizens
within the ECOWAS region and ECOWAS' common approach on migration
could provide tangible responses to the challenges faced by
refugees and migrants in West Africa.

Regional and international migration flows within and outside of
the West African region will also be discussed with a special
emphasis on finding ways to promote regular and safe migration
flows in order to reduce irregular migration flows.

 

Keynote speakers include Mohamed Ibn Chambas, the president of the
ECOWAS Commission, IOM Director General William Lacy Swing, UNHCR
Assistant High Commissioner Erika Feller and OHCHR Director of the
Treaty Bodies and Human Rights Council Division, Bacre Waly
Ndiaye.

The Dakar conference follows a similar event organized by UNHCR
in May 2008 in Sanaa, Yemen to look at refugee protection and
international migration in the Gulf of Aden.

This conference is funded by the European Commission, the US
State Department's  Bureau of Population, Refugees and
Migration and the Organisation Internationale de la
Francophonie.

For further information, please contact:

Severine Cirlande

IOM Dakar

Tel:  +221 77 101 10 06

E-mail: "mailto:scirlande@iom.int">scirlande@iom.int