FORUM ON MINORITY ISSUES Presentation by Leopold von Carlowitz PROTECTION OF PROPERTY RIGHTS OF REFUGEES AND DISPLACED PERSONS IN EASTERN EUROPE AND IN AFRICA Mme Chairperson, Mme Independent Expert, Distinguished delegates and colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, In my name and on behalf of the Berlin-based Center for International Peace Operations (ZIF) which is the German Government agency to support international peace operations, I would like to thank the organizers of the forum for inviting me to speak at this important event. You might want to ask what international peacekeeping has to do with the protection of property rights for minorities. The promotion and protection of human and minority rights is one essential component of post-conflict peacebuilding, a concept directed at consolidating peace by addressing the root causes of conflict. Property and land issues, in particular the unjust or discriminatory distribution of resources – often at the cost of minorities, lie at the heart of many violent conflicts. Property restitution or compensation is not just an important part of transitional justice activities in the aftermath of ethnic cleansing campaigns, it is also a pre-condition for the return or resettlement of refugees and displaced persons – most of them tend to belong to minority groups in their given context. Finally, the regularization of and equal access to property rights is seen as a central element to the rule of law as such and therefore as a basis for a stable and peaceful society. In this presentation, I would like to focus on the protection of property rights of refugees and displaced persons in post-conflict settlements. In this area, there has been amazing progress in the last two decades, in particular in comparison with the situation after the Second World War. One might argue that the post-1945 stability in Central and Eastern Europe, but also in the Near East, was grounded on the notion of ethnically homogenous nation states that did without much of their minorities who were regarded as a threat (fifth column). You may also argue that the newly