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world refugee day
Burma's Refugees Deserve Global Solidarity and Support
Ending the illegal junta is the first step to securing human rights-based livelihoods for refugees and the millions of civilians who have long deserved peace and democratic rule.
Jun 21, 2021
Sunday, June 20 marked the United Nations' World Refugee Day, a time to highlight refugees worldwide, applaud their courage, and highlight their contributions. This year's theme, "Heal, Learn, Shine," recognized the challenges of COVID-19, the need to uphold the right to education, and how refugees persevere despite the challenges presented to them. According to the UN, there are greater than 1.1 million refugees from my home country of Burma, making it one of the top five source countries of refugees worldwide. While many may celebrate World Refugee Day, those forced to flee Burma continue to witness repeated mass atrocities.
As the number of people fleeing the Burmese military's violence has only increased since the coup, seeking refuge in Thailand has proven increasingly difficult for Burma's ethnic minority refugees as Thai officials fear the spread of COVID-19 and strictly police their borders.
"Despite impossible conditions and a consistent lack of international support, there are numerous examples of how refugees from Burma impact communities around our world."
Estimates report that in March and April, close to 3,000 Karen internally displaced persons (IDPs) crossed the Salween River to seek refuge in Thailand, only to be held by Thai officials until conditions were deemed secure enough to turn them away. Similarly, more than 100,000 Karenni civilians escaping conflict in their home state were met with force at the Thai-Burma border, where officials attempted to push back thousands.
Safety and security for refugees are immensely rare, even on the occasion that they are accepted by host countries. Refugees are uniquely affected by a number of factors, and, during a pandemic, are disproportionately impacted by COVID-19. Often crammed into tight living situations with inadequate hygiene facilities, the ability to escape COVID-19's grip is almost impossible for Burma's refugees. With more than 1 million Rohingya refugees living in
Bangladesh, estimates report close to 1,369 cases of COVID-19 in Rohingya refugee camps. Vaccine supplies are also far from refugees' reach-- as of June 1, no COVID-19 vaccines have been distributed in Cox's Bazar.
Education remains unavailable to refugees from Burma and across the diaspora in Bangladesh, India, Thailand, and Malaysia. While some children are able to attend small, community-run schools, the general lack of educational opportunities forces entire generations from Burma to face their future unprepared. A May 2021 study reported that 68 percent of Rohingya families have at least one child, aged 5 to 17, that has been offered no opportunities to gain an education.
Despite impossible conditions and a consistent lack of international support, there are numerous examples of how refugees from Burma impact communities around our world. The Chin Human Rights Organization has empowered thousands of Chin refugees in India and Malaysia to help them reach their full potential. With help from the Rohingya Women Development Network, Rohingya women in Malaysia are taught about their rights and the key roles they play in society. Internally displaced Karenni and their refugee diaspora are supported by the collective work of the Karenni Civil Society Network, a Karenni-led effort that also speaks out against the human rights abuses experienced by ethnic minorities across Burma. While these efforts are worthy of celebration and highlight what refugees contribute to our communities, this impact would be amplified to the greatest extent if these individuals could bring their talent home to Burma for the benefit of all.
It is difficult for civilians in Burma to heal when the Burma army continues to brutalize its own people. However, despite their pain, refugees and IDPs are learning to empower themselves. However, they cannot do this alone. If the situation in Burma does not improve, the reported 175,000 internally displaced men, women, and children--a figure that is doubtlessly a conservative estimate--will likely become refugees.
The Burmese military's impunity weighs heavily on the minds of refugees in Southeast Asia and IDPs in Burma who look to their home country and wonder if their chance to safely return is slipping away. Refugees in camps and those resettled abroad are calling for the world to act, but is anyone listening? While everyone has the right to protection and freedom from the risk of death and torture, now more than ever, we need a world that will sustainably uphold the rights of all.
The international community should be compelled to take swift action to pressure the Burmese military to allow unconditional humanitarian access to internally displaced people. Cross-border aid is also essential and beyond crucial to the survival of the hundreds of thousands living in makeshift and refugee camps. Ending the illegal junta in Burma is the first step to securing human rights-based livelihoods for refugees and the millions of civilians who have long deserved peace and democratic rule. Only then can we collectively begin a new and more equitable process to heal, learn, and shine.
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Refugee Planet: There Have Never Been This Many Displaced People on Earth
Half of refugees worldwide are children, new United Nations report finds
Jun 20, 2016
An unprecedented 65.3 million people have been displaced around the world due to war and persecution, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) reported on Monday.
The new figure is not only a 21st-century record but also the first time that the numbers have surpassed 60 million. This means one in every 113 people worldwide is now either an asylum-seeker, internally displaced, or a refugee, the UN said. Half of them are children.
Over the past five years, forced displacement has increased quicker than ever due to long-standing conflicts in regions like Somalia and Afghanistan; "dramatic" escalations in newly destabilized countries like Syria, Yemen, and Ukraine; and a growing resistance from other nations to providing asylum for refugees, the UN reported.
"More people are being displaced by war and persecution, and that's worrying in itself, but the factors that endanger refugees are multiplying too," said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi.
Grandi also warned on Sunday that a "climate of xenophobia" was spreading due to political rhetoric painting refugees as terrorists or beggars. "Refugees... don't bring danger" but "flee from dangerous places," he told Agence France-Presse.
The UN's report, Global Trends (pdf), was released to mark World Refugee Day on June 20 and in conjunction with the agency's #WithRefugees campaign, which calls on governments to ensure asylum seekers are given education, safe shelter, and opportunities to work.
"At sea, a frightening number of refugees and migrants are dying each year; on land, people fleeing war are finding their way blocked by closed borders," Grandi said Monday. "Politics is gravitating against asylum in some countries. The willingness of nations to work together not just for refugees but for the collective human interest is being tested today, and this spirit of unity badly needs to prevail."
Syria at 4.9 million, Afghanistan at 2.7 million, and Somalia at 1.1 million together accounted for more than half the refugees under the UNHCR mandate. The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, in total, saw the highest number of displaced people in 2015. Intervention in Syria--led in part by the U.S.--has seen at least 4.9 million people driven out of the country and at least 6.6 million displaced internally, totaling around half of the nation's pre-war population.
Hikmat, a Syrian farmer now living in a tent in Lebanon with his family, told the UN, "We're stuck here. We can't go on, and we can't go back. My children need to go to school; they need a future."
Elsewhere in the world, people fleeing drug gangs in Central America contributed to a 17 percent rise in displacement in the region. At the same time, refugees from Asia and the Pacific accounted for almost a sixth of global refugees and internally displaced people in 2015. Meanwhile, as Europe and the U.S. have largely turned their backs on asylum seekers, Pakistan and Iran held onto their position as two of the world's leading refugee host countries. In fact, 86 percent of refugees are currently living in low- and middle-income countries close to areas of conflict, such as Ethiopia, Jordan, and Turkey.
The report excluded people displaced by natural disasters such as floods and earthquakes, which uprooted at least 19 million people in 2015, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, which released its own report in May.
UNHCR said the 2016 report must act as a "watershed moment" for the cause.
"World leaders can no longer watch passively as so many lives are needlessly lost," the report states. "We must be smart about finding solutions to help refugees. We must find humane and dignified means to ensure refugees don't risk their lives and those of their families by resorting to ruthless traffickers or by boarding flimsy boats in a bid to reach safety."
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