raise similar problems for the original landowners. In the vast majority of cases documented by Human Rights Watch, land dispossession linked to the crisis is rooted in illegal land sales: When Guérés were displaced by the conflict, other Guérés—from neighboring villages, or even the same family—came in behind and sold land that did not belong to them, most often to recent arrivals of Burkinabé migrants. The seller, who often engaged in theft and fraud, gets off scot free. While some Burkinabé buyers purchased in good faith, others were complicit, clandestinely buying enormous parcels of land from young Guérés whose legal authority to sell such land would have been questioned by any reasonable person. The guilty parties benefit, without fear of sanctions, while the true landowner suffers greatly. In a minority of the cases documented by Human Rights Watch, land dispossession has occurred by force, rather than by illegal sale. Some non-natives used a landowner’s absence to increase their landholdings, for example when a person who purchased and confined himself to two hectares before the crisis seized and planted on additional hectares, to which he has no claim, while the owner was displaced. Finally, in a very small number of cases, groups of non-natives have wholesale commandeered land. These cases appear confined to forest areas that are located near government-owned protected forests, particularly the protected forest of Goin-Débé. Perhaps thinking that they were installing themselves in the protected forest, these groups occupied areas in the immediate vicinity, but on land owned privately by people displaced by the conflict. In all cases of land dispossession linked to displacement, the Ivorian government has failed to fulfill its responsibilities under the African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (Kampala Convention), which requires states to “take necessary measures to protect individual, collective and cultural property left behind by displaced persons”79; and the United Nations Principles on Housing and Property Restitution for Refugees and Displaced Persons, better known as the Pinheiro Principles.80 The Pinheiro Principles, which draw from the rights to property, home, and housing, as well as the recognized right to a remedy for human rights violations,81 state that “[a]ll refugees and 79 African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (Kampala Convention), entered into force December 6, 2012, art. 9(2)(i). 80 United Nations Principles on Housing and Property Restitution for Refugees and Displaced Persons (hereinafter Pinheiro Principles), U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/2005/17 (2005), endorsed Sub-Com. res. 2005/21, U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/2006/2 at 39 (2006). 81 For a good discussion on the history and foundation of the Pinheiro Principles, as well as a guide for their implementation, see FAO, IDMC, OCHA, OHCHR, UN-Habitat, and UNCHR, Housing and Property Restitution for Refugees and Displaced Persons: Implementing the ‘Pinheiro Principles’, March 2007, http://www.refworld.org/docid/4693432c2.html (accessed September 20, 2013). 29 HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH | OCTOBER 2013