Refugee crisis reached ‘unseen’ levels in 2012: UN
About 7.6 million people had to leave their homes due to conflict or persecution in 2012, including 1.1 million refugees who fled to another country.
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An estimated 7.6 million people had to leave their homes due to conflict or persecution last year, including 1.1 million new refugees who fled to another country for safety, says the United Nations.
“The Year 2012 was marked by refugee crises reaching levels unseen in the previous decade,” said the U.N. High Commission for Refugees global trend report released this week.
“An average of 3,000 people per day became refugees in 2012, five times more than in 2010.”
Many of the 1.1 million refugees who managed to escape their homelands came from the conflicts in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mali, Syria and the border area between South Sudan and Sudan.
About 6.5 million people were displaced within the borders of their countries, almost twice as many as in 2011, and the second highest in a decade.
The new additions in 2012 pushed the globally displaced population past 45 million — 15.4 refugees and 28.8 million internally displaced people — a level that was only surpassed by the record 47 million displaced reported in 1994.
With the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its partners withdrawing their combat troops by the end of 2014, Afghanistan remained the top source of refugees, with almost 2.6 million of its nationals displaced in and outside of the country.
It was followed by Somalia, at 1.13 million; Iraq, 746,400; Syria, 728,500; and Sudan, 569,200. The top five countries made up 55 per cent of all refugees worldwide.
By the end of 2012, developing countries hosted over 80 per cent of the world’s refugees, up 10 per cent from ten years ago. The 49 least developed countries were providing asylum to 2.4 refugees by year-end.
Pakistan was host to the largest number of refugees worldwide (1.6 million, almost all from Afghanistan), followed by Iran, (868,200), Germany (589,700) and Kenya (565,000).
“Conflict in the Syrian Arab Republic forced 647,000 people to flee mainly to neighbouring countries. This was the largest annual exodus by a single refugee group since 1999, when more than 867,000 people fled Kosovo,” said the 48-page report.
“The total number of Syrian refugees at the end of 2012 was 728,500, making them the fourth largest refugee group in the world – a jump from 36th place a year earlier.”
Meanwhile, improved country conditions also allowed displaced refugees to return to their homelands.
Last year, the UNHCR ceased to recognize the refugee status of Angolans who fled as a result of conflicts between 1961 and 2002, as well as Liberians who escaped the civil wars between 1989 and 2003. The UN agency will also recommend the same treatment for Rwandan refugees by the end of June.
As a result, some 46,000 refugees were repatriated to Angola; 29,500 to Liberia and 11,200 to Rwanda.
During the year, a total of 88,600 refugees were accepted to 22 countries through government resettlement programs, including 66,300 to the United States, 9,600 to Canada; 5,900 to Australia; 1,900 to Sweden and 1,200 to Norway.
In 2012, 70,400 refugees filed asylum claims in the U.S, the top country, followed by 64,500 in Germany; 61,500 in South Africa; 55,100 in France and 43,900 in Sweden. The overall acceptance rate was 38 per cent.
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