‘Migration is part of today’s world’

International Migration 2020 Highlights, published by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), shows that the pandemic may have slowed migration flows by around two million people last year, cutting the annual growth expected since mid-2019 by around 27 per cent.

Since the year 2000, however, there has been a major increase in migration. That year some 173 million people lived outside of their countries of origin. Twenty years later, that figure had risen to 281 million.

In a statement, Liu Zhenmin, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, said “The report affirms that migration is a part of today’s globalized world and shows how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the livelihoods of millions of migrants and their families, and undermined progress in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.”

Less money sent home

The economic crisis that following in the wake of the pandemic has had a major impact on remittances, the money migrants send home to their countries of origin. The World Bank projects that remittances sent back to low- and middle-income countries may see a $78 billion dip, around 14 per cent of the total amount.

This will negatively affect the livelihoods of millions of migrants and their families, especially in those countries with a big diaspora. India, for example, has the largest diaspora in the world: 18 million people born in India live outside the country. Other nations with significant diasporas include Mexico, the Russian Federation (11 million each), China (10 million) and Syria (eight million).

US and Germany top destinations

Unsurprisingly, high income countries are the most coveted destinations for migrants. The US takes the top spot with 51 million migrants hosted in 2020.

Germany hosted the second largest number of migrants worldwide, at around 16 million, followed by Saudi Arabia (13 million), the Russian Federation (12 million) and the United Kingdom (nine million).

Many migrants do not travel far, however. Nearly half of them remain in the region from which they originated. For example, in Europe 70 per cent of migrants come from another European country. Similarly, some 63 per cent of migrants in sub-Saharan Africa come from a country in the same region.

Most refugees in lower income countries

Contrary to some perceptions, the vast majority of refugees, around 80 per cent, are hosted in low- and middle-income countries, and constitute some 12 per cent of all international migrants.

The number of refugees is rising faster than voluntary migration: the number of people forced to leave home due to conflict, crises, persecution, violence or human rights violations has doubled from 17 to 34 million since the beginning of the 21st Century.

In recognition of the need to better manage migration, the General Assembly has adopted several landmark agreements, including the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants and the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. DESA says that around 60 countries have begun to adopt measures to ensure safe, orderly and regular migration.

​Gonzalo Vargas Llosa, UNHCR’s Representative for EU Affairs, also called for reform to be central during negotiations over a new EU Pact on Migration and Asylum, and highlighted the importance of “an EU that saves lives, protects refugees in Europe and globally, and finds solutions to end forced displacement and build resilient societies is needed more than ever”.  

To this end, the UN agency recommended that the EU Presidency propose predictable, principled and solidarity-focused measures for a rights-based and sustainable asylum system.  
They also stressed the need to address root causes of forced displacement and irregular migration and revitalize political and financial support in countries and regions, where most of those forcibly displaced people live. 

“We hope that 2021 will be a new chapter for refugee protection, with the EU showing leadership in Europe and globally”, said Mr. Vargas Llosa. 

UNHCR hopes the proposed EU Pact will be adopted quickly, which includes enhancing search and rescue operations and ensuring predictable disembarkation. 

“As negotiations on the EU Pact continue, we trust that EU Member States will seize the opportunity to lead by example and better protect people seeking asylum in Europe”, said Mr. Vargas Llosa.  

More asks UNHCR encouraged the presidencies to explore avenues for progress on issues, such as solidarity and border procedures and advocate for fair and fast asylum procedures for international protection; dignified returns for those who wish to return to their countries of origin; and predictable solidarity mechanisms for States that receive a disproportionate number of asylum claims. 

With 85 per cent of the world’s refugees living in developing countries, UNHCR is also calling on the EU presidencies to ensure predictable, flexible, development, together with humanitarian-based financial aid, as well as support to host States, including strengthening asylum systems.  

Renewed action plan Against the backdrop that fewer people might undertake dangerous journeys if countries demonstrated greater commitment to resettlement and family reunification, UNHCR welcomed the European Commission’s renewed Action Plan on Integration and Inclusion, 2021-27. 

“The 2021 EU Presidencies have a pivotal role to facilitate discussions that pave the way to a common and workable EU asylum system that protects people fleeing war and persecution”, said the UNHCR Representative.

“The highest cost will be the cost of doing nothing,” Triggs said at a virtual session of UNHCR’s annual High Commissioner’s Dialogue on Protection. “We need to act together. Unilaterally, we simply can’t respond effectively.”

In a discussion moderated by Al Jazeera India correspondent Elizabeth Puranam, Triggs was joined by displaced, NGO, academic and government speakers to debate the effects of climate change on the world’s most vulnerable people, including those who have been forced to flee their home or are stateless. Drawing similarities with the COVID-19 pandemic, participants said the world must protect the vulnerable but also involve them in finding solutions.

“If we want to solve the problem of climate change, we have to put the most vulnerable in the centre,” said Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, an activist from Chad who advocates for environmental justice and Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Chad and other countries in Africa’s Sahel face one of the fastest growing displacement crises and are disproportionately exposed to the adverse effects of climate change and disasters, such as changing rain patterns contributing to floods and droughts.

The world’s vulnerable endure some of the worst effects of climate change. Rising temperatures can increase food, water, and land insecurity, while disrupting services necessary for human health, livelihood, settlement, and survival. Invariably, among the most affected are older people, women, children, people with disabilities, and indigenous peoples.

The last decade was the hottest on record. In 2019, nearly 2,000 disasters, most of them weather hazards, triggered 25 million new displacements.

Climate change has continued to accelerate while the world fights the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There is no vaccine, there is no mask. We cannot close the border to climate change – this is not the solution,” Ibrahim said. “So we must act … and take all the solutions from science to traditional knowledge to save our people and our planet.”

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees appointed a Special Advisor on Climate Action for strategic guidance and shaping UNHCR’s response to enhance the resilience of displaced people to climate risks and strengthen preparedness and resilience in disaster situations.
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Established in 2007, the High Commissioner’s Dialogue enables the exchange of views between refugees, governments, civil society, the private sector, academics and international organizations on emerging challenges in humanitarian protection. This year’s five virtual sessions focus on the impact COVID-19 on displaced and stateless people.

The first children, out of some 10,000 children whose citizenship applications have so far been accepted, received their long-awaited Iranian identity document – known as a ‘Shenasnameh’, last month.

According to the Government of Iran, nearly 75,000 children at risk of becoming statelessness are eligible for Iranian citizenship under a new nationality law, which was amended in 2019 to allow children under 18 years to apply for the identity documents.

During the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran, UNHCR has continued providing free remote legal advice and assistance to parents of children whose mothers are Iranian nationals and whose fathers are foreign nationals, to help them through the nationality application process.

By allowing Iranian mothers to pass their nationality to their children, the law also marks a ground-breaking step towards reducing the gender gap in Iran, where nationality used to be passed on mainly by fathers.

Although Iran is not party to the UN Conventions on Statelessness, the Government of Iran is taking steps towards the prevention and reduction of statelessness in the country. While the law does not give mothers and fathers equal rights to confer nationality to their children, it represents significant progress.
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Around the world, stateless people can face a lifetime of exclusion and discrimination and are often denied access to education, health care, and job opportunities – making them vulnerable to exploitation and abuse.​

Special presentations by UNHCR are “VOICES FROM SYRIA” and “MEMORY AND THE REFUGEE EXPERIENCE,” which will conclude the One World Refugee Film Festival while also marking a special milestone for UNHCR.

“VOICES FROM SYRIA,” which premieres on 1 December 2020, is a curated selection of four documentaries, including Harmony for After War (Pablo Tosco and Migue Roth), Wajd: Songs of Separation (Amar Chebib), A House for the Syrians (Nadine Beaudet and Christian Mathieu Fournier) and The Rest (Ai Weiwei). To kick off the festival on 1 December 2020, a unique conversation with Syrian-Canadian filmmaker Amar Chebib, hosted by Maryam Shah from the Toronto Star, will be live-streamed at 20:00 EST.

“MEMORY AND THE REFUGEE EXPERIENCE,” which coincides with the 70th anniversary of UNHCR on 14 December, will showcase three documentaries featuring past and ongoing refugee crises, Memories of Mogadishu (Asha Siad), Memory is Our Homeland (Jonathan Durand), and Yemen: the Silent War (Sufian Abulohom). A special conversation with Polish-Canadian filmmaker Jonathan Durand and Rema Jamous Imseis, UNHCR’s Representative in Canada, hosted by Jim Creskey, founder and publisher of The Hill Times, will be live-streamed at 20:00 EST.

Profits from UNHCR events will go to Matthew House Ottawa, a local shelter helping and supporting refugee claimants.

Film descriptions, information on the programming presented by partners, and additional information about the One World Refugee Film Festival can be found at owrff2020.eventive.org.

Programming by UNHCR is open to the media, and interviews with Rema Jamous Imseis and filmmakers can be made available.
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Backgrounder:

• At the end of 2019, an unprecedented 79.5 million or 1 percent of humanity — a figure that has almost doubled since 2010, were displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, or human rights violations. Syrian and Yemeni nationals continued to be among the largest forcibly displaced populations worldwide.
• This year marks the 70th anniversary of UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. UNHCR was created in 1950, in the aftermath of the Second World War, to help millions of Europeans who had fled or lost their homes. Today, 70 years later, UNHCR is still hard at work, protecting and assisting refugees around the world.
• Founded in 1972, One World Arts is a volunteer-based, charitable organization working to create awareness on world issues. One World Arts’ mission is to work together with Canadian artists and organizations involved in human rights, social justice, and the environment to further public education on issues that concern our global communities.

GPC data indicates that of the 54 million people targeted for assistance in 26 humanitarian response plans, almost 40 million could be missing out this year.

“The human toll of the pandemic on the world’s vulnerable should not only be measured by the number of lives it has taken, but by the eclipsing number it has shattered. COVID-19 has hardest hit millions of people with absolutely no access to protection services. Children recruited by armies cannot reclaim lost childhoods. Women raped and beaten wear their scars for life,” said Jan Egeland, Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council.

Gender-based violence has increased dramatically since the onset of COVID-19. Experts projected in April that for every three months lockdown measures continued around the world, an additional 15 million women and girls would be exposed to gender-based violence.

In Mali, over 4,400 cases of gender-based violence were reported between January and September, but only 48 per cent of towns had support services. In the Central African Republic (CAR), reported incidents of gender-based violence more than doubled, including rape, sexual slavery and forced marriage. CAR was already one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a woman or girl. In Niger, reports have been received of women being tortured for engaging in economic activity outside of the home, and not wearing full veil coverings.

Child marriages are also on the rise. Thirteen million more underage marriages could occur over the next 10 years because of the side effects of the pandemic, according to UN estimates. Trafficking is also a concern, with protection aid workers in 66 per cent of the countries surveyed reporting that people are at increased risk of trafficking due to COVID-19.

An increase in violence and armed conflict has also been recorded, with attacks on civilians increasing by 2.5 per cent since the pandemic began. For example, over 1,800 violent events involving communal armed groups have been registered since the start of the pandemic – a 70 per cent increase – largely across East and West Africa.

“COVID-19 is inflicting an unprecedented human rights crisis for the world’s most vulnerable. Millions of internally displaced and conflict-affected people are in harm’s way or are falling through the gaps,” said UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Protection, Gillian Triggs.

“The world cannot afford to be complacent and indifferent to their plight. Millions of lives are at stake. Humanitarians can only do so much. Armed conflict continues to be the main driver of forced displacement, so peace is indispensable to end conflict and suffering.”

According to the report released today, the gap between protection needs during the pandemic and protection funding is growing wider. This year’s funding for protecting people most in need of assistance in humanitarian crises has received just 25 per cent of what is needed. Furthermore, historically nearly 70 per cent of funding for protection services comes from just five donors; the European Union, United Kingdom, Germany, the United Nations and the United States.

“As we enter the new year, the aftershocks of 2020 will begin to take hold. As our report shows, more funding is needed not only to save lives and heal wounds, but also to effectively prevent new outrageous abuse and violence from taking place,” warned Jan Egeland.
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Facts and figures:

• In 2020, 54 million people were targeted for protection assistance in Humanitarian Response Plans, including COVID-19 additional plans, across 26 operations where the Protection Cluster is active. This number does not include countries without a Humanitarian Response Plan, Refugee Response Plan as the data is not yet available for 2020. The real number will be much higher.
• Between 2013 and 2019, the protection sector received only 38 per cent of its requirements compared with 61 per cent overall for humanitarian appeals. In 2020, only 24 per cent of requirements had been met by November.
• In Mali, 66 per cent of gender-based violence survivors reported since January are girls under 18 years old.
• Northern Mozambique is one of the fastest growing protection crises in the world. In November, civilians witnessed massacres by non-state armed groups in several villages, which resulted in beheadings and abductions of women and children.
• In Yemen, it is estimated that more than two thirds of girls are married before they reach 18 years of age, compared to 50 per cent before the conflict.
• Funding for protection in Cameroon in 2020 has fallen wildly short of what is needed. Only 13 per cent of requirements have been received so far, which is just $3 per person. This has left more than 2 million people without assistance.
• According to the UN Population Fund, 48 per cent of Venezuelan women on the move are travelling alone, putting them at serious risk for human trafficking and all forms of gender-based violence.