UN General Assembly
1995

on by the Security Council, and in the face of the jeopardizing of our national security and the serious threats that face our population — resorted to one of the existing international instruments concerning refugees, namely General Assembly resolution 2312 (XXII), of 14 December 1967, the Declaration on Territorial Asylum, to urge the international community and the United Nations to shoulder their responsibilities, because Zaire does not have the means to bear alone the burden of the massive presence of refugees in its territory, particularly since it is on the eve of holding elections. I would recall, since much has been said about this, that the second preambular paragraph of the Declaration on Territorial Asylum states that a person faced with persecution “has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution” and paragraph 1 of article 3 states that such a person shall not be “subjected to measures such as rejection at the border or, if he has already entered the territory in which he seeks asylum, expulsion or compulsory return”.