Human Rights and Natural Disasters: Operational Guidelines and Field Manual on Human Rights Protection in Situations of Natural Disaster 2008

Although disasters are quick to strike, their consequences can be long to remedy and can linger on for months and years. The extent to which their effects increase inherent inequalities in life and society is to a significant extent a question of how governments and humanitarian actors integrate human rights into their disaster preparedness and response.

To promote and facilitate a rights-based approach to disaster relief, the InterAgency Standing Committee (IASC) adopted Operational Guidelines on Protecting Persons in Natural Disasters in June 2006. This Pilot Manual has been drafted to accompany the Operational Guidelines. It intends to help people in the field to understand the human rights dimensions of their work in disaster response while giving them practical examples and operational steps about how some of these seemingly abstract concepts may be implemented. This draft has been long in coming.