Integrating resettlement in international refugee law

Resettlement undisputedly consists of the transfer of refugees based on their need for protection elsewhere: resettlement consequently is the deliberate replacement of the defaulting asylum state with another state that is prepared to meet the protection needs of the refugees concerned in the sense defined in the relevant refugee law instruments which entails that immigration selection criteria cannot be justified. In terms of applicable procedure: there is no reason why UNHCR should not apply a proper procedure (similar to its RSD procedure); as to states, by virtue of Art. 26 ICCPR, their RSD procedures should be applied to the refugees concerned: the different mode of arrival does not justify withholding those procedures in case of controlled arrival. In short, the present resettlement practice has not applied the normative changes that have taken place since 1951 and unjustifiably retained a (migration) practice that originates in a time when states did not have relevant international obligations pertaining to refugees.