Despite the assertions by many, including eminent refugee scholars, UNHCR, and other refugee advocates, and except within the contexts of the regional regimes of Africa and Latin America, international law, including the 1951 Refugee Convention (and its 1967 Protocol) and the customary international law of non-refoulement, does not obligate States to admit into their territories asylum seekers or refugees, including those who appear at their frontiers seeking territorial asylum. This Article establishes this claim, considers this absence as a normative incoherency within international refugee law, and then concludes by urging States to consent to an obligation to admit asylum seekers who appear at their frontiers and provide them territorial asylum, at least on a temporary basis.

Continue reading Refugees, Refoulement, and Freedom of Movement: Asylum Seekers’ Right to Admission and Territorial Asylum