We bring resources together for use by refugee legal aid advisors and advocates.

Resources for legal aid providers are scattered over the internet; we bring them together at one site, thus making it easier for legal aid organisations from any country to work collaboratively. Our aim is to strengthen and expand rights-based advocacy as well as to promote skilled legal aid for refugees through increasing efficiency, effectiveness, and raising standards of professionalism in the specialty of legal aid for refugees.

We promote information exchange between refugee legal aid advisors, through facilitation connections and providing avenuers for contact. We hope our resources, particularly those outside of our organisation, are helpful, but we do not accredt any site and it is important that you check it meets your needs. Please contact us if you find problems.

Rights In Exile

Rights in Exile is a monthly forum that updates aspects of refugee legal aid so that legal aid providers can stay current on issues. With a focus on major geographical areas in the global South (Asia, Africa, Latin America, and non-EU Europe), it highlights issues and major events relevant to legal aid providers, clarifies developments in the interpretation of refugee law, and lists cases which might serve as precedent from other constituencies. The newsletter also supplies helpful reports and resources for refugee legal aid NGOs and provides articles that bring forth accounts of struggles and of success in the field.

Training in Refugee Law

Training in refugee law is badly needed, as is the continual upgrading of legal advisers’ skills and knowledge of developments in refugee law. The IRRI provides training opportunities through remote tutoring, self-study courses on this website, and — funding dependent — intensive courses implemented in critical sites around the world.

Moderated List-serv: Rights in Exile Mailing List

In order to join Rights in Exile Refugee Assistance click here. This google group enables lawyers/paralegals to discuss refugee cases & urgent matters in which they need assistance, anonymously. If you are asking a question about a case, remember not to reveal a name, although it is likely that nationality and the particularities of the law in the state you are dealing with will be relevant to any help or suggestions another lawyer may try to give you. You can always ask for help directly via your personal email.

Users can also talk to each other around the globe about policy issues that we might sometimes decide to act together on, and exchange information about relevant conferences, vacancies, and the like.

This is a list primarily for lawyers and researchers. It is not for government officials or UNHCR staff (the latter may be a member of staff where a member of this group is discussing a case they are representing).

Please encourage lawyers/paralegals in your country who represent refugees to post to this group and become members.

Objectives of the Rights In Exile Programme

The Rights in Exile Programme works to achieve better protection of refugee rights by networking legal assistance providers with resources and training, and facilitating access to free legal assistance and information for refugees around the world.

We do this through:

  1. Legal Resources
    A centralised database of contact details of free legal assistance providers in over 230
    countries, a database of country of origin experts, our post-deportation monitoring project,
    and information on legal processes relating to refugees.
  2. Refugee Resources
    Contact information for UNHCR offices and free legal assistance providers all over the
    world.
  3. Other Resources
    A selection of publications, films, media contacts, courses, and other tools for improving
    understanding of refugee circumstances and legal processes.
  4. Special Issues
    Resources and contacts on special issues in refugee status determination, including LGBTI,
    witchcraft accusations, the exclusion clause, gender-based persecution, and other emerging
    or under-resourced areas.
  5. Training
    Specialised distance learning courses on refugee law.
  6. Newsletter
    A monthly newsletter highlighting key developments in refugee and asylum law from around
    the world.

We encourage refugee law practitioners to join the discussion.
This website has been designed to accommodate those who only have low-bandwidth internet access; hence no pictures or logos. The exception is our films.

Please contact us with your suggestions, to get involved, or to help us grow our network.


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