Never before have so many people been on the run as now. This is shown by the figures of the current Global Trends Report 2022 of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). According to the report, 108.4 million people were fleeing worldwide at the end of 2022. This figure includes refugees, asylum seekers, internally displaced persons and other people in need of international protection. 40 percent of all refugees are children. In total, this means 19 million more people are fleeing their homes than at the end of 2021—an increase of 21 percent. This is the largest increase in one year ever recorded by UNHCR.
The main reason for this rapid increase is the Russian attack on Ukraine, which forced millions of people to flee. Globally, Turkey (3.6 million), Iran (3.4 million), Colombia (2.5 million), Germany (2.1 million) and Pakistan (1.7 million) were home to the largest refugee groups at the end of 2022. The top five refugee source countries are Syria with 6.5 million, Ukraine with 5.7 million, Afghanistan with 5.7 million, Venezuela with 5.5 million, and South Sudan with 2.3 million.
In 2022, the highest number of new asylum applications ever—2.6 million—was registered by more than 140 nationalities in 155 countries. Although 1.3 million asylum claims were decided globally, a 27 percent increase over 2021 and the highest number since 2017, the number of asylum seekers waiting for a decision on their case increased by 18 percent to 5.4 million.
In addition to conflict and violence, people are also displaced by disasters within their countries. During the year, 32.6 million disaster-related internal displacements were reported. The largest number of people displaced due to disasters within their country was reported in Pakistan (8.2 million) after the country was hit by floods. In the Philippines and China, cyclones, floods and tropical storms led to the displacement of 5.4 million and 3.6 million people, respectively.
In light of these new highs, Filippo Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, calls for, “Not only does displacement currently affect many more people, but it is no longer a short-term and temporary phenomenon. We need a fundamentally new and more positive attitude toward all who flee—coupled with a much more determined effort to resolve conflicts that last for years and are at the root of this immense suffering.”
View the full UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) Global Trends Report 2022:
global-trends-report-2022.pdf (uno-fluechtlingshilfe.de)
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www.tuenews.de
Flüchtlingsunterkunft Tübingen. Foto: tünews INTERNATIONAL / Mostafa Elyasian.
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