Facing what he called a “moment of truth,” the head of the United Nations refugee agency has called for fully expanding its mission from assisting those displaced from their countries to also helping the tens of millions uprooted within their own homelands.

 

And he appealed for concerted international action to preserve the institution of asylum.

 

UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) António Guterres was addressing the opening ses

In Sri Lanka a white van without a number plate is a symbol of terror and the disappearances that occurred in all parts of the country.

 

Commissions on Disappearances in the South during the last few years of the 1980s have documented at some length how armed men, travelling in white vans without number plates abducted thousands of people who were never seen again. These reports are available at www.disappear