The document is a position paper from New Zealand for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees that addresses three topics: the Syrian refugee crisis, protecting refugees' rights, and protecting refugees from human trafficking. For the Syrian refugee crisis, New Zealand supports increasing aid and ensuring refugees' safety and rights. For refugees' rights, New Zealand promotes host states receiving support, sharing best practices, and regional cooperation. For human trafficking, New Zealand urges preventing exploitation of refugees and prosecuting traffickers while protecting victims.

1. Delegation from Represented by
New Zealand University of California, Riverside
Position Paper for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The topics before the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) are: The Syrian Refugee Crisis;
Protecting the Civil, Political and Socioeconomic Rights of Refugees; and Protecting Refugees from Human
Trafficking. New Zealand is dedicated to addressing the pressing issues before the committee.
I. The Syrian Refugee Crisis
Realizing that the Syrian Refugee Crisis is the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II, New Zealand
endorses S/2014/840, which details the impact the Syrian civil war has on the refugees. As per the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, New Zealand urges fellow Member States to take additional steps to ensure the fair
and equal treatment of all people. New Zealand is committed to helping all peoples in need facing war or
catastrophe, and has contributed resources and aid to Syrian Refugees, an effort promoted by A/RES/66/253 which
calls for Member States to increase humanitarian aid to those affected by the Syrian civil war. Seeing how the
number of Syrian Refugees is growing daily affects neighboring countries and that the resources are dwindling, New
Zealand hails S/RES/2139, calling for an increase in infrastructure and aid. New Zealand urges fellow Member
States to protect the refugees from armed groups to ensure their safety and security, and by protecting their right to
live peacefully, and that those that do commit such crimes should be held accountable, as stated by S/RES/2043.
Echoing S/2014/31, New Zealand condemns attacks and sexual assault on children by governmental or militia
forces, remaining committed to protecting the rights of all, regardless of race, nationality, age, religion or gender.
New Zealand urges fellow Member States to take part in the Geneva Conference on Syria, which calls for fellow
Member States to find a solution to end the Syrian civil war, creating a new means of hope for refugees displaced by
the conflict, and guaranteeing a peaceful end to the war.
New Zealand hopes that Member States, through cooperative representation will facilitate consistency across
national regulations and assist in fair and equal legislation for the protection of Syrian Refugees. New Zealand calls
for Member States to follow organizations such as the non-governmental organizations Disaster Relief Forum
(NDRF) which implements programs that assist Syrian Refugees through aid donations ranging from medical
supplies to food, ensuring the wellbeing of all refugees. New Zealand strongly believes that by giving host nations
better assistance, fellow Member States can better serve Syrian refugees. In order to ensure this, New Zealand
encourages Member States to coordinate with non-governmental organizations such as World Vision to help protect
the wellbeing of women and children from the effects of Syrian civil war. New Zealand understands the need for the
Geneva Conference, which would help to stop the war in a peaceful manner, making sure that the people of Syria
live and prosper for more generations to come by working together with fellow Member States.
II. Protecting the Civil, Political, and Socioeconomic Rights of Refugees
The UN High-Commissioner’s Dialogue on Protection Challenges discusses challenges on protecting refugees that
the international community must address and New Zealand believes we must work from. A/RES/69/189 mentions
how Member States can address violations of humanitarian law in regards to refugees, which New Zealand finds
paramount to improved efforts towards protecting migrants. The large number of refugees is cause for concern as
more people in increasingly desperate situations are often left out of the benefit of economic growth, as discusses in
A/RES/69/154. Host states thereby must receive more support for the refugee populations they shelter, and greater
efforts must be taken to provide for the rights of refugees. Regional efforts have been successful in providing for the
needs of refugees, however more can be accomplished as discussed in A/RES/68/182. A/HRC/24/58 states the
importance of preventing trafficking and assisting women who often face significant challenges as refugees.
New Zealand supports a partnership between the UN Relief Works Agency and the UNHCR in order to protect the
rights of refugees in the Middle East. Further, the UNHCR can work with Member States through partnerships to
assist refugees. New Zealand encourages providing assistance and resources to host states so that they can help
refugees better access their rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Further New Zealand
promotes sharing best-practices on protecting the rights of refugees and for Member States to take action to protect
against forced return. New Zealand encourages efforts to improve voluntary repatriation and further cooperation by

2. establishing working groups on local integration and/or voluntary repatriation. These must work in tandem with
enhanced regional efforts to protect refugees.
III. Protecting Refugees from Human Trafficking
According to article 3 of the Trafficking in Persons protocol, “trafficking in persons” is defined as “the recruitment,
transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of
coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving
or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the
purpose of exploitation.” Refugees are especially vulnerable to human trafficking because they are afraid that they
will be reported if they do not follow what their trafficker is asking them to do. Currently, there are policies set in
place to help victims of human trafficking but those same policies do not necessarily help out victims of human
trafficking who are also refugees. Member States have committed through The United Nations Global Plan of
Action to Combat Trafficking in Persons (A/RES/64/293) to speaking about the social, economic, cultural, political
and other factors that make individuals susceptible to trafficking, such as poverty, joblessness, disparity,
humanitarian emergencies, including war and natural disasters, sexual violence, gender discrimination, social
exclusion, as well as a culture of tolerance towards violence against women, youth and children. New Zealand urges
member states to criminalize trafficking in persons in all of its forms, including sexual exploitation of women and
children, labor exploitation and sexual tourism. Additionally, in order to combat a prevalent form of migrant
exploitation, human trafficking, New Zealand seeks to focus on three main areas: prevention of human trafficking,
which includes target awareness and identification, protection and repatriation for victims, and prosecution, which is
often disregarded for reasons such as impunity. To this end, New Zealand offers up the New Zealand Plan of Action
to Prevent People Trafficking as a model for other Members States to combat these crimes.