E/CN.4/1503 page 53
114. To summarize very briefly the foregoing, the overview of the past decade amply demonstrates that the consequences of mass exodus situations may be measured in terms not only of human suffering but also of threats to national or regional
peace and stability.
115. People leave for a variety of reasons, and usually as a combination of factors rather than a single one. The social contract has failed temporarily or permanently. Modernization and progress have made casualties of people who held certain
customs and traditions too dear. In the chaos of war and
post-war reconstruction, populations may have been repeatedly uprooted, and thereby
and thereby conditioned for a further uprooting from their country when the going is hard. Colonialism
left a heritage of artificial boundaries and structurally
imbalanced economies. The repressive tactics of white
-
Most provisions of
minority régimes have made many victims.
the Declaration of Human Rights have been violated.
116. These "push factors" must be viewed against a series of
economic realities in developing countries, such as high
population growth, global food insecurity and a hunger-induced rise in death rates, inflation, unemployment, the flight of
skilled manpower and ecological deterioration - which taken in combination may bring large sectors
bring large sectors of the population of the
world's poorest countries to the threshold of economic distress. Deficiencies in infrastructure, the high cost of equipping
modern armed forces, loss or reduction in both trade and aid
and the calamitous impact of oil price rises have in the last
ten years further handicapped young nations lacking any tra-
dition of statehood. One result has frequently been the