War Displaced Person’s Rights – Case study Ukraine

A lot has been written or said about refugees in the media during the last years, but who are refugees, and who are not? Why do states have an obligation towards their protection and what kind of obligation? Who is to be protected by international refugee protection right and who is not? What are the rules of protection in the EU and who does this work and how? If you are wondering about these questions and are interested in working with refugees and asylum seekers in your own country or in building an international career to work with UN, within the international humanitarian sector, you have a unique opportunity to receive the education from the world-renowned experts during the 10-days intense and interactive academic training this summer! The Summer School employs an interactive learning environment using a combination of lectures, documentary films, debates and open discussions, enabling participants both to contribute to and gain an in-depth knowledge of asylum adjudication procedures and refugee rights in practice. Instructors at the school are experienced and committed lawyers, scholars, practitioners and activists in the field that will bring a comparative and locally focused perspective to the international protection debate.

Course leader

Dr Selma Porobic

Target group

The school is open to professionals and students from all backgrounds and academic disciplines. Our participants typically include staff from the main refugee and humanitarian international organisations, regional and local refugee, human rights and humanitarian NGOs, government officials working on refugee protection, scholars and researchers working directly on forced migration issues as well as practicing lawyers, advocates, journalists and activists working on refugee protection and the human rights of forced migrants.

Course aim

This is the 9th International Summer School in Refugee Law and Rights founded in 2012, by late OBE Prof. Emerita Barbara Harrell-Bond from the University of Oxford and Dr. Selma Porobić. The school is modeled according to summer schools initiated by late professor Harrell-Bond in the 1980s as pioneering academic refugee law training for the humanitarians. We bring together leading academics and practitioners focusing on both theoretical and practical aspects of the legal refugee protection, to proactively contribute to its advancement through future careers in academia, UN, governmental and non-governmental organizations, media, and other sectors of work. Our goal is to advance the skills for protection and to help build cooperation networks in responding to the current challenges of access to international refugee protection in Europe and globally. Due to the recent Russian Federation's aggression on Ukraine and the ongoing war with massive scale displacement of civilians, our school this year will be donated to V.N Karazin Kharkiv National University in Ukraine and transformed into the summer school entitled ‘War-displaced Persons’ Protection Rights - Case study Ukraine. The school offers a 10-day hybrid training programme and is co-organized between V. N Karazin Kharkiv National University in Ukraine and Palacky University Olomouc.