E/CN.4/2002/94 page 13 The connection between asylum and migration 41. The Special Rapporteur takes a positive view of the debate between the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) on the connection between asylum and migration that began during the Global Consultations staged in 2001 by UNHCR. She points out that respect for the institution of asylum must be ensured, together with respect for the human rights of migrants, asylum-seekers and refugees, during efforts to control migration. 42. The Special Rapporteur sees two key topics emerging from this debate. One is the need to ensure that migration management and control policies protect human rights, to avoid the various kinds of abuse to which migrants, asylum-seekers and refugees are subjected. The other is the ambiguity inherent in deciding who is a migrant and who a refugee. The Special Rapporteur finds it increasingly difficult to distinguish between the two. 43. Many migrants resort to the asylum system for want of regular channels for migration; facing a hardening of policy on the granting of asylum, paradoxically, increasing numbers of migrants are resorting to illegal migration to escape violence and persecution. Fear of being denied refugee status, of being put in a refugee camp, of the unsafe conditions in those camps and of being seen and identified as refugees are all factors which the Special Rapporteur sees as pushing refugees to go underground. 44. As a member of the expert panel on refugees and migrants set up by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and UNHCR for Human Rights Day, the Special Rapporteur emphasized that migrants and refugees should not have to compete for protection. The debate over asylum and migration should encourage stricter regard for the 1951 Convention and for States’ commitments on human rights in all matters relating to migration control and the protection of migrants’ rights. The Special Rapporteur is uneasy about linking protection to asylum and refugee status exclusively. She considers it important to recall the resolutions constituting her mandate in which States indicate that they are encouraged by the increasing interest among the international community in the full and effective protection of the human rights of all migrants. The situation since 11 September 45. In a statement issued on 25 September 2001, the Special Rapporteur forcefully condemned the attacks mounted against the United States of America on 11 September. She appealed for people not to associate terrorism with migration, saying that Governments had a responsibility to combat terrorism in all its forms, while it was important not to damage the system of rights characteristic of democratic societies which terrorism sought to destroy. She appealed for migrants not to be viewed as a category whose rights could be violated simply because they were not nationals. In her public statements since 11 September the Special Rapporteur has reminded States of their duty to improve their security and intelligence systems so as to protect all those living within their territory, migrants included. At the eighty-second session of the IOM Council, she told member States that “the alternative to unregulated migration which can damage a State’s security and does in fact harm migrants’ rights is to control migratory flows, especially when there is a real demand for migration”.