Unprecedented Increase in Displaced Persons Worldwide: One Out of Every 113 People on Earth is a Refugee
The latest statistics from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees show that wars and violence across the globe have set a new record in the number of refugees, with 65.3 million people becoming displaced and homeless in the past year alone. This comes as borders between countries become increasingly difficult to cross, asylum laws grow stricter, and xenophobia intensifies in refugee-receiving societies.
According to the annual report of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, released on World Refugee Day, “the number of refugees has grown by 50 percent over the past five years. Additionally, the number of refugees in 2015 compared to 2014 increased by more than six million.
Based on these statistics, one out of every 113 people in the world is now a refugee, displaced person, or asylum seeker.
Syria with 4.9 million displaced persons, Afghanistan with 7 million, and Somalia with 1.1 million are the three countries heading the list of unstable nations in the world in 2015.
Felipe Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said on Monday, June 20, at a press conference in Geneva: “The message from refugees and migrants crossing the Mediterranean Sea and reaching the shores of Europe is that if we do not solve these problems, they will afflict us as well.”
He urged wealthy and powerful nations of the world to end the refugee surge by finding political solutions to wars and violence.
In 2015, two million asylum applications were registered in industrialized countries, with 100,000 applications filed by unaccompanied or separated children. This figure, which set a new record, is three times the number of asylum seekers in 2014.
Source: RFI
