A/68/283 migration. The Special Rapporteur has evaluated the options mentioned by the Global Commission, including creating a new agency, possibly by merging IOM and UNHCR; designating a lead agency, such as UNHCR or ILO; and bringing IOM into the United Nations system. He has also considered other measures to strengthen the current institutional framework. 1. New United Nations organization 102. Proposals have been made to establish a new United Nations organization with a specific mandate on international migration. Owing to the significant resources which would be required, this is not very likely to be accepted by States in the near future. 103. It has been suggested that, rather than creating a completely new agency, an agency could be created by merging IOM and UNHCR. The two organizations are already cooperating closely. However, a merger seems difficult to achieve, as long as UNHCR is a United Nations agency with a protection mandate based on the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and IOM is not part of the United Nations system and has no protection mandate. 2. Expand the mandate of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to cover all migrants 104. As an alternative to merging IOM and UNHCR, which seems difficult, an option that has been discussed is to expand the mandate of UNHCR to cover all migrants. The agency’s mandate is currently limited to asylum seekers and refugees, stateless persons and internally displaced persons. Having one United Nations entity dealing with refugees, and none dealing exclusively with migrants, has resulted in the neglect of the rights of migrants, who are sometimes referred to as “mere” or “economic” migrants with no protection needs, even though this is often not the case. 105. While expanding the refugee agency’s mandate would make sense substantially, it is to be feared that if this were to happen, migrants would not receive the same attention as refugees, as UNHCR has already built up expertise from working with refugees for more than 60 years and the normative basis for its work is the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. Conversely, some might also fear that expanding the mandate of UNHCR would detract from its very important refugee protection mandate. 3. Creating a lead agency on migration 106. There is currently no lead agency on migration, either inside or outside the United Nations system. As long as the mandate of UNHCR does not cover all migrants, designating it as the lead agency for migration would not be advisable. 107. ILO has a constitutional mandate to protect migrant workers and is dedicating an increasing amount of its work to labour migration. While many persons cross borders to seek decent work and livelihoods, not all migrants are migrant workers, and migrants have rights and needs which expand beyond labour-related rights. This would make it difficult for ILO to have a holistic approach to migration beyond labour migration. 20/26 13-42115