Human Rights

In widely circulated media reports in the days following the disaster of hurricane Katrina, victims of the hurricane were labeled “refugees.” Other reports had victims rejecting such classifications and insisting on their status as American citizens. As a matter of international law, it is clear that persons who were forced to flee the hurricane and the subsequent disasters on the Gulf coast are not refugees. Rather, the international community refers to such persons as internally displaced. A particular set of international standards applies to them.