A/HRC/31/35 analyse the situation of migrants in transit from the point of view of the migrants themselves. 7. Migrants in transit risk a range of human rights violations and abuses, including because they have become destitute or “stranded” in the transit country and because they lack legal protection and are unable or unwilling to seek the protection of the country of transit. Migrant women in transit often face specific gendered forms of discrimination and abuse, both in the public and private spheres. At the same time, States may question their obligations towards migrants who are in transit and not intending to remain on their territory.4 8. In the absence of a universal, legal definition, OHCHR has defined an “international migrant” as “any person who is outside a State of which he or she is a citizen or national, or, in the case of a stateless person, his or her State of birth or habitual residence”. 5 In using the term “migrant” to describe the subjects of this study, the intention is not to exclude refugees or other legal categories, but rather to use a neutral term for a group of people who have in common a lack of citizenship attachment to their host country. 6 Such an approach stems from recognition of the inherent dignity and equal and inalienable rights of every human being.7 9. The study will thus consider the situation of all migrants in transit, with a particular focus on those in an irregular situation and those who are most marginalized and at risk, including children on the move. Migrants in transit 10. The drivers for the movement of migrants are multiple and often intertwined. In addition to persecution and conflict, today, the reasons that compel movement include poverty, discrimination, lack of access to rights, including education and health, lack of access to decent work, violence, gender inequality, the wide-ranging consequences of climate change and environmental degradation, and separation from family. In many regions, migrants with varying protection profiles and reasons for movement move along the same routes and use the same transport or means of travel in so-called “mixed flows”, often in large numbers. 11. Migrants who move out of necessity rather than free choice are at greater risk of human rights violations throughout their migration, are less likely to be able to make choices or to formulate exit strategies and are therefore more likely to migrate in conditions 4 5 6 7 4 Council of Europe, Parliamentary Assembly, “Countries of transit: meeting new migration and asylum challenges”, Report (Doc. 13867), 11 September 2015. The Council notes that countries that experience transit migration, in whatever form, are rarely, if ever, only “countries of transit”; many are also countries of destination and/or asylum (p. 3). See OHCHR, Recommended Principles and Guidelines on Human Rights at International Borders (2014) chap. I, para. 10. Available from www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Migration/ OHCHR_Recommended_Principles_Guidelines.pdf. See Opening statement by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights at the panel discussion, “Promoting tolerance, dispelling myths, protecting rights: an evidence-based conversation on migration”, held in Geneva on 15 December 2015. Available from www.ohchr.org/EN/ NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=16889&LangID=E. See Universal Declaration of Human Rights, art. 2; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 2 (3); International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, art. 2 (2); and International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, art. 7.