ICMC

1. General activities of the organization:

With staff in over 40 countries, the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) works directly and through a network of 172 member organisations, to provide durable solutions to refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs) and migrants, prioritising the most vulnerable and marginalised among these groups. ICMC focuses its services and assistance on following areas:

- Return and reintegration assistance in home countries, including reunification of families;
- Local Integration assistance in places to which uprooted people have fled;
- Refugee Resettlement in a third country, including pre-departure cultural orientation and rapid deployment of skilled staff
- Casework and services to Extremely Vulnerable Individuals (EVIs), among which Psycho Social Services
- Counter-trafficking programmes and services, including providing shelter to victims.
- Training, community and NGO capacity building
- Technical cooperation with governments to strengthen institutional responses to refugees, IDPs and migrants.
- Emergency response and solutions responding to immediate needs of victims
- Policy-building and Advocacy

As a UNHCR implementing agency, ICMC has a long experience with return and (re)integration of refugees and IDPs – in the ‘80s and ‘90s in South East Asia, between 2002 and 2004 in Afghanistan and over the last decade in the Balkans.

• In Asia ICMC has been implementing programmes for the reintegration of displaced villagers to their communities in Maluku Province and Ambon. At present ICMC is offering technical assistance to the Indonesian Social Welfare Ministry, under a World Bank funded project to facilitate the return and reintegration of IDPs.

• ICMC has over a decade of experience working throughout the Balkans in a range of innovative programs, developing some of the region's first integrated economic revitalization; community stabilization and minority return projects. In Kosovo, over the last 5 years, ICMC assisted and facilitated the sustainable return and community based reintegration of 9000 voluntary minority returnees from Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia through the Individual Minority Return Assistance (IMRA) Programme. To sustain the returns of low-income returnees and minorities ICMC provides opportunities for returnees, ethnic minorities, and ethnic Albanians to establish or expand sustainable, income generating micro-enterprises that deliver goods or services that contribute to the stabilization of their communities and assist returnee families, ethnic minority remainees and majority communities, to make their war-damaged homes habitable, while contributing to community stabilization. Inter-ethnic cooperation and dialogue is fostered through the development of community projects that promote ethnic tolerance and reconciliation.
• ICMC has been also operating for 6 years, the Lead Agency program funded by UNHCR facilitating assistance to vulnerable groups and minorities in the population areas of Prizren and Pejë/Pec in Kosovo. The main objectives of the programme are: to create conditions conducive to a return ensuring that most basic needs and rights are met; to advocate for increased access of minorities to essential public services, to provide legal advice and other administrative assistance to minority returnees; to advocate for protection of IDPs and minorities-at-risk; to ensure adequate contingency preparedness to prevent and respond to possible population movements and displacement; to support durable solutions for the community-based reintegration of minority returnees, mostly through the capacity building of the concerned municipal authorities leading them to take the ownership over the return process. The project is also enhancing gender and age sensitiveness in the implementation of its activities.

• ICMC’s involvement in assistance programmes to returnees from EU countries to Serbia and Kosovo has been modest. ICMC has assisted ERSO members Cordaid and Caritas Belgium on an ad-hoc basis, providing social, mediation and referral services.

Annual Report ICMC 2007

2. ERSO member is funded by:

European Commission, ECHO, UNHCR, UNDP, US BPRM, Caritas organizations, private donations

3. Target group of the ERSO member (in the context of return and reintegration):

The target group of ICMC Return and Reintegration project in Kosovo consists of minority returnees, internally displaced persons and refugees, originating from various ethnic communities: Gorani, Bosniak, Serb, Ashkali, Roma and Egyptian.

4. Does the ERSO member offer pre-departure counseling?

ICMC is collecting information on conditions for return and provide information to potential men and women minority returnees and internally displaced persons within Kosovo. Some return fora are prepared in cooperation with IDP associations and other organizations such as the Danish Refugee Council (DRC).

5. What kind of reintegration assistance does the ERSO member offer to returnees?

ICMC provides the following protection and assistance components:
- Food assistance for Extremely Vulnerable Individuals (EVIs)
- Distribution of domestic items and household support for needy persons
- Self reliance projects for families to have their basic needs covered
- Organization and facilitation of Community Discussion Groups
- Income generation projects
- Vocational and skills trainings
- Legal assistance and protection: collection and provision of information, identification, verification of returns, registration, needs assessment, referrals, monitoring and follow up visits.
- Advocacy vis à vis service, security and protection providers assuring services provision.
- Advocacy with local authorities to become more engaged in return activities in line with their roles and responsibilities
- Resolution of property issues
- Prevention and response to Sexual Gender Based Violence incidents
- Confidence building meetings organized in cooperation with municipal structures
- Training and guidance of IDP local associations, community volunteers and municipalities
- Enhance the Gender and Age Diversity Dimension in the projects with returnees
- Development of Contingency planning, preparedness and early warning response mechanisms

6. Partners in the context of voluntary return and reintegration:

National level: Caritas Belgium

EU level: European Union Mission

Countries of origin: United Nations Interim Administration Mission (UNMIK) , Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG) : Ministries of Communities and Returns, MCR; Local Government Administration, MLGA; Labour and Social Welfare, MLSW; Internal Affairs, MIA; and Justice, MOJ