Let’s open our hearts for refugees
As June 20 marks the ‘World Refugee Day’ to raise awareness of the situation of refugees throughout the world, let’s have a look into the very refugee matters.
Who is a refugee?
The UN defines, a refugee is someone who has been forced to flee his or her country because of persecution, war, or violence. A refugee has a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group. Most likely, they cannot return home or are afraid to do so. People, displaced from their homes but remain in their country are not considered as refugees.
How many refugees are there around the globe?
According to the UNHCR reports 2/3 of all refugees worldwide come from 5 countries- Afghanistan, Syria, South Sudan, Somalia and Myanmar. The UN Agency said in its annual report that 68.5 million people were displaced globally at end of 2017. Among the 68.5 million, 16.2 million people displaced during 2017 itself. It indicates that a huge number of people being displaced every day equivalent to 44,500, or a person becoming displaced every two seconds! OMG. Wars, internal conflicts, other violence and persecution escalated forced displacement in 2017 for the 5th year in a continuum, led by the crisis in Congo, South Sudan war, and the flight of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar.
Where are they going?
Globally Turkey is the foremost host of refugees, nearly 3 million refugees reportedly have a life inside its borders at the end of 2016. Pakistan is 2nd with 1.6 million refugees. Lebanon is 3rd with a 1 million. Iran is home for 978, 000, Ethiopia have nearly 740,000, Jordan with 700,000, Kenya with 523,000, Uganda with 512,000, Germany with 470,000….The highest number of asylum claims filed by individuals from Afghanistan, about 124,900 claims in 80 different countries. America was the largest recipient of asylum requests in 2017, UNHCR report said. As per the report, there were 197,146 refugees in India at the end of 2017 and 10,519 unsettled asylum cases. Globally 40,391 asylum seekers were from India at the end of 2017.
How to ease the crisis?
The number of refugees across the world has rocketed for 5–6 years consecutively. Meantime, humanitarian support is acutely pinched. The United Nations refugee agency, the UNHCR and its allies have got less than 17% of the funds required this year to render basic assistance to millions of refugees and displaced people. The same awful situation enduring elsewhere with less than half the amount of humanitarian funds needed in the majority of conflict-affected countries. And most of the countries chiefly developed, are nervous about the outcome of providing asylum to displaced, also citizenry are concerned about it, perhaps Islamophobia prevails as a major cause. So it’s imperative to convince the people of host country in order to provide a harmonious and healthy living for the displaced.
85% of all refugees and displaced people live in low-income countries. Most people who are displaced by internal violence remain within the borders of their homeland. Those who are forcefully displaced willing to stay as close as they can to home in adjacent nations. Only a small fraction, less than 1% globally are resettled elsewhere, including in West. The world’s poorer nations are bearing the burden while developed ones awestruck or unwilling to do their humanitarian obligation. It is uncertain that how long they will continue to do this or withstand irrespective of policies in wealthier nations.
Since as many as 2/3 of all the refugees come from just a few countries: Syria, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Myanmar and Somalia. The most fitting plan to alleviate the crisis is to lower the number of displaced people by cope with the conflicts that instigate them to leave their homes. For achieving this people and nations must act together based on common interests and global aspirations for sustainable peace, equality and right to liberty: understanding that this is an essential requirement when facing problems of international dimensions. It is in the interests of our security and our ethos. It will require different entities working together to share the burden appropriately.
Indian context
India always had an open heart to welcome refugees, and has hosted persecuted Jews, Tibetans, Sri Lankan Tamilians, Afganis etc. It has expressed its solidarity and raised its voice towards protection of refugees at several international rostrums including UNO. And is home for 197,146 refugees who’ve forced to leave due to persecution in their home countries even while it doesn’t have an Asylum Code and is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention. India is a signatory to the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants, which was adopted by 193 countries in September 2016. There was some efforts to enact a refugee code in the country, the latest was the Asylum Bill 2015 introduced by member of parliament Dr.Shashi Tharoor, former UN under secretary. However it didn’t pass, and now in the light of Rohingya issue there is a grave need to develop an appropriate code. So far Modi regime’s Rohingya refugee management was off the cuff.
Global Compact on Refugees (GCR)
After New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR) formed. The Compact aims at correlated go to reinforce international response to refugee deeds in a long-term basis. Its 2 key objectives are to reduce problems of host countries and enhance refugee friendly atmosphere. The GCR acknowledges that the burden is now more on under developed and developing countries, which host more than 85% of the total refugees in the world. So it understands that the burden should be fairly shared with wealthy western countries too. Hence it calls for support from the international community in the form of resources and funding. It also trying to establish associations to have fruitful discussions on economic opportunities, employment and security for refugees and also on ‘how to use refugees positively’ for the host community. Since the Declaration was adopted, the UNHCR has been negotiating with member states, UN organs, and NGOs to develop a plan for its pragmatic implementation, this is expected to settle by the end of 2018.
Dear friends, we live in a divisive age. But history had shown our ability to unite, overcome crisis and renew relationship with other nations sagaciously. That is the mightiest strength of an open world. We should take the debates for global peace over sheer political advantages. We are being tested in many ways today and our retaliation will be the measure of principles of humanity. Let’s open our heart, open our borders for refugees regardless of race, color and religion; they are also humans.
Sidharth K
References:-
1) unhcr.org
2) refugeecouncilusa.org
3) unrefugees.org
4) ohob.org.uk
