UNHCR established its presence in Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine at around the same time in the mid 1990s. Belarus and Moldova acceded to the 1951 Convention and its 1967 Protocol in 2001 followed by Ukraine in 2002. In all three countries UNHCR is actively engaged with the Governments and supported by NGOs in developing national legislation and building effective asylum systems which are in compliance with international law. For this purpose UNHCR invested in the region some USD 30,000,000 (in particular USD 20,000,000 in Ukraine, USD 5,000,000 in Belarus and USD 5,000,000 in Moldova).
Since UNHCR established a presence in the three countries of the region, according to the official data of the governments of Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine as of 1 January 2006, overall 6,455 asylum seekers were granted refugee status (5,362 in Ukraine, 773 in Belarus and 320 in Moldova). Of those, 3,136 are still registered as residing in the sub-region, the majority in Ukraine (2,346) then in Belarus (706) and Moldova (84). In the three countries, refugees live predominantly in urban areas with a large majority in the respective capital cities Kyiv, Minsk and Chisinau. In 2005, the asylum authorities in the three countries processed overall 1,999 new asylum claims (1,740 in Ukraine, 118 in Belarus and 141 in Moldova) and 144 persons were recognised as refugees (49 in Ukraine, 41 in Belarus and 54 in Moldova). In Ukraine, a total of 742 refugees have been naturalised since 2002. In Belarus, during 2004-2005, a total of 3 refugees received Belarusian citizenship. So far no refugees in Moldova were naturalized as nobody fulfilled the eight years stay requirement.
In 1996, the government of Ukraine invited UNHCR to assist it in re-integrating formerly deported people who returned to Crimea. UNHCR responded by launching a large-scale citizenship campaign, income generation, shelter rehabilitation and tolerance education programmes. At a volume of 5.3 million USD, the assistance that UNHCR provided over the last eleven years to the reintegration of returnees in Crimea constitutes the most comprehensive programme related to the prevention and reduction of statelessness that UNHCR implemented so far in any one country. As a result some 250,000 returnees have been assisted to obtain Ukrainian citizenship. Every year some 3,000 formerly deported persons (and their descendants) arrive to Crimea, therefore UNHCR continues to provide free legal aid to returnees through a local NGO.
The CBCP Secretariat, established in Kyiv in May 2003 - in cooperation with the Swedish Migration Board and IOM, with EC/TACIS funding - covers primarily Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine and the region at large. The Secretariat acts as a service and co-ordination centre and conducts various activities, in particular thematic meetings and workshops, research, newsletters, networking and sharing of information, aimed at increasing the capacity of the participating countries to develop legislation and practices for the establishment of adequate migration management and asylum systems. The Secretariat is based in Kyiv in the UNHCR premises, and its activities are funded by the EC until February 2009.
