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"Refugee" redirects here. For the 2000 Bollywood film, see Refugee (film).
A refugee is "a person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of their nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail him/herself of the protection of that country" (according to the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees).
The concept of a refugee was expanded by the Conventions’ 1967 Protocol and by regional conventions in Africa and Latin America to include persons who had fled war or other violence in their home country. A person who is seeking to be recognized as a refugee is an asylum seeker. In the United States a recognized asylum seeker is known as an asylee.
Refugee was defined as a legal group in response to the large numbers of people fleeing Eastern Europe following World War II. The lead international agency coordinating refugee protection is the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), which counted 8.4 million refugees worldwide at the beginning of 2006. This was the lowest number since 1980.Refugees by Numbers 2006 edition, UNHCR The major exception is the 4.3 million Palestinian refugees under the authority of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), who are the only group to be granted refugee status to the descendants of refugees according to the above definition.Publications/Statistics, UNRWA, update as of 31 March 2006 The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants gives the world total as 12,019,700 refugees and estimates there are over 34,000,000 displaced by war, including internally displaced persons, who remain within the same national borders. The majority of refugees who leave their country seek asylum in countries neighboring their country of nationality. The "durable solutions" to refugee populations, as defined by UNHCR and governments, are: voluntary repatriation to the country of origin; local integration into the country of asylum; and resettlement to a third country.Framework for Durable Solutions for Refugees and Other Persons of Concern, UNHCR Core Group on Durable Solutions, May 2003, p. 5
Refugees arrive in Travnik, central Bosnia, during the war, 1993. Photo by Mikhail Evstafiev
As of December 31, 2005, the largest source countries of refugees are the Palestinian Territories, Afghanistan, Iraq, Myanmar, and Sudan. The country with the largest number of IDPs is Sudan, with over 5 million. According to UNHCR estimates, over 4.2 million Iraqis have been displaced since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, with 2 million within Iraq and 2.2 million in neighbouring countries.UN warns of five million Iraqi refugeesIraq: Refugee Crisis Could Become Regional Security Threat At least 60,000 Iraqis are losing their homes and becoming refugees every month.UNHCR says 4.2 million Iraqis are displaced in, outside Iraq http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/07/23/MNGPCR4S601.DTL&feed=rss.news
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The concept of sanctuary, in the meaning that a person who fled into a holy place could not be harmed without inviting divine retribution, was understood by the ancient Greeks and ancient Egyptians. However, the right to seek asylum in a church or other holy place, was first codified in law by King Ethelbert of Kent in about 600 A.D. Similar laws were implemented throughout Europe in the Middle Ages. The related concept of political exile also has a long history: Ovid was sent to Tomis and Voltaire was exiled to England. Through the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, nations recognized each others\' sovereignty. However, it was not until the advent of romantic nationalism in late eighteenth century Europe that nationalism became prevalent enough that the phrase "country of nationality" became meaningful and people crossing borders were required to provide identification.
The term "refugee" is sometimes applied to people who may have fit the definition, if the 1951 Convention was applied retroactively. There are many candidates. For example, after the Edict of Fontainebleau in 1685 outlawed Protestantism in France, hundreds of thousands of Huguenots fled to England, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Norway, Denmark and Prussia. Various groups of people were officially designated refugees beginning in World War I.
The first international coordination on refugee affairs was by the League of Nations\' High Commission for Refugees. The Commission, led by Fridtjof Nansen, was set up in 1921 to assist the approximately 1,500,000 persons who fled the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent civil war (1917–1921), most of them aristocrats fleeing the Communist government. In 1923, the mandate of the Commission was expanded to include the more than one million Armenians who left Turkish Asia Minor in 1915 and 1923 due to a series of events now known as the Armenian Genocide. Over the next several years, the mandate was expanded to include Assyrians and Turkish refugees.[http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1938/nansen-history.html Nansen International Office for Refugee: The Nobel Peace Prize 1938], nobelprize.org In all of these cases, a refugee was defined as a person in a group for which the League of Nations had approved a mandate, as opposed to a person to whom a general definition applied.
In 1930, the Nansen International Office for Refugees was established as a successor agency to the Commission. Its most notable achievement was the Nansen passport, a passport for refugees, for which it was awarded the 1938 Nobel Peace Prize. The Nansen Office was plagued by inadequate funding, rising numbers of refugees and the refusal by League members to let the Office assist their own citizens. Regardless, it managed to convince fourteen nations to sign the Refugee Convention of 1933, a weak human right instrument, and assist over one million refugees. The rise of Nazism led to such a severe rise in refugees from Germany that in 1933 the League created a High Commission for Refugees Coming from Germany. The mandate of this High Commission was subsequently expanded to include persons from Austria and Sudetenland. On 31 December 1938, both the Nansen Office and High Commission were dissolved and replaced by the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees under the Protection of the League. This coincided with the flight of several hundred thousand Spanish Republicans to France after their loss to the Nationalists in 1939 in the Spanish Civil War.Spanish Civil War fighters look back
The conflict and political instability during World War II led to massive amounts of forced migration. In 1943, the Allies created the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) to provide aid to areas liberated from Axis powers, including parts of Europe and China. This included returning over seven million refugees, then commonly referred to as displaced persons or DPs, to their country of origin and setting up displaced persons camps for one million refugees who refused to be repatriated.
After the defeat of Germany in World War II, the Potsdam Conference authorized the expulsion of German minorities from a number of European countries (including Soviet- and Polish-annexed pre-war East Germany), meaning that 12,000,000 ethnic Germans were displaced to the reallocated and divided territory of Allied-occupied Germany. Between the end of World War II and the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961, more than 563,700 refugees from East Germany traveled to West Germany for asylum from the Soviet occupation.
Also, millions of former Russian citizens were forcefully repatriated (against their will) into the USSR.The United States and Forced Repatriation of Soviet Citizens, 1944-47 by Mark Elliott Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Jun., 1973), pp. 253-275 On 11 February 1945, at the conclusion of the Yalta Conference, the United States and United Kingdom signed a Repatriation Agreement with the USSR.Repatriation -- The Dark Side of World War II The interpretation of this Agreement resulted in the forcible repatriation of all Soviets regardless of their wishes. When the war ended in May 1945, British and U.S. civilian authorities ordered their military forces in Europe to deport to the Soviet Union millions of former residents of the USSR, including numerous persons who had left Russia and established different citizenship many years before. The forced repatriation operations took place from 1945-1947.Forced Repatriation to the Soviet Union: The Secret Betrayal
At the time, UNRRA was shut down in 1949 and its refugee tasks given to the International Refugee Organization (IRO)."United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration," The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The International Refugee Organization was a temporary organization of the United Nations (UN), which itself had been founded in 1945, with a mandate to largely finish the UNRRA\'s work of repatriating or resettling European refugees. It was dissolved in 1952 after resettling about one million refugees."[http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0825355.html International Refugee Organization %u2014 Infoplease.com." The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The definition of a refugee at this time was an individual with either a Nansen passport or a "Certificate of Eligibility" issued by the International Refugee Organization.
At the end of the World War II, there were more than 5 million "displaced persons" from the Soviet Union in the Western Europe. About 3 million had been forced laborers (Ostarbeiters)Final Compensation Pending for Former Nazi Forced Laborers in Germany and occupied territories.Forced Labor at Ford Werke AG during the Second World WarThe Nazi Ostarbeiter (Eastern Worker) Program The Soviet POWs and the Vlasov men were put under the jurisdiction of SMERSH (Death to Spies). Of the 5.7 million Soviet prisoners of war captured by the Germans, 3.5 million had died while in German captivity by the end of the war.Soviet Prisoners of War: Forgotten Nazi Victims of World War IISoviet Prisoners-of-War The survivors on their return to the USSR were treated as traitors (see Order No. 270).The warlords: Joseph StalinRemembrance (Zeithain Memorial Grove) Over 1.5 million surviving Red Army soldiers imprisoned by the Germans were sent to the Gulag.Patriots ignore greatest brutalityJoseph Stalin killer file
At the time, UNRRA was shut down in 1949 and its refugee tasks given to the International Refugee Organization (IRO)."United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration," The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The International Refugee Organization was a temporary organization of the United Nations (UN), which itself had been founded in 1945, with a mandate to largely finish the UNRRA\'s work of repatriating or resettling European refugees. It was dissolved in 1952 after resettling about one million refugees."[http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0825355.html International Refugee Organization %u2014 Infoplease.com." The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The definition of a refugee at this time was an individual with either a Nansen passport or a "Certificate of Eligibility" issued by the International Refugee Organization.
Poland and Soviet Ukraine conducted population exchanges - Poles that resided east of the established Poland-Soviet border were deported to Poland (ca. 2,100,000 persons) and Ukrainians that resided west of the established Poland-Soviet Union border were deported to Soviet Ukraine. Population transfer to Soviet Ukraine occurred from September 1944 to April 1946 (ca. 450,000 persons). Some Ukrainians (ca. 200,000 persons) left southeast Poland more or less voluntarily (between 1944 and 1945).Forced migration in the 20th century
At the time, UNRRA was shut down in 1949 and its refugee tasks given to the International Refugee Organization (IRO)."United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration," The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The International Refugee Organization was a temporary organization of the United Nations (UN), which itself had been founded in 1945, with a mandate to largely finish the UNRRA\'s work of repatriating or resettling European refugees. It was dissolved in 1952 after resettling about one million refugees."[http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/history/A0825355.html International Refugee Organization %u2014 Infoplease.com." The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, © 1994, 2000-2005, on Infoplease, © 2000–2006 Pearson Education, publishing as Infoplease. (accessed 13 October 2006) The definition of a refugee at this time was an individual with either a Nansen passport or a "Certificate of Eligibility" issued by the International Refugee Organization.
Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) (established December 14, 1950) protects and supports refugees at the request of a government or the United Nations and assists in their return or resettlement. All refugees in the world are under the UNHCR mandate except Palestinian Arabs who fled the future Jewish state between 1947 and 1948 (see below). However, Palestinians who fled the Palestinian territories after 1948 (for example, during the 1967 six day war) are under the jurisdiction of the UNHCR.
UNHCR provides protection and assistance not only to refugees, but also to other categories of displaced or needy people. These include asylum seekers, refugees who have returned home but still need help in rebuilding their lives, local civilian communities directly affected by the movements of refugees, stateless people and so-called internally displaced people (IDPs). IDPs are civilians who have been forced to flee their homes, but who have not reached a neighboring country and therefore, unlike refugees, are not protected by international law and may find it hard to receive any form of assistance. As the nature of war has changed in the last few decades, with more and more internal conflicts replacing interstate wars, the number of IDPs has increased significantly to an estimated 5 people worldwide.
It succeeded the earlier International Refugee Organization and the even earlier United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (which itself succeeded the League of Nations\' Commissions for Refugees).
UNHCR was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1954 and 1981. The agency is mandated to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve refugee problems worldwide. Its primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country.
Many celebrities are associated with the agency as UNHCR Goodwill Ambassadors, currently including Angelina Jolie, Giorgio Armani and others. The individual who has raised the most money in benefit performances and volunteer work on behalf of UNHCR was Luciano Pavarotti[1].
UNHCR\'s mandate has gradually been expanded to include protecting and providing humanitarian assistance to what it describes as other persons "of concern," including internally-displaced persons (IDPs) who would fit the legal definition of a refugee under the 1951 Refugee Convention and 1967 Protocol, the 1969 Organization for African Unity Convention, or some other treaty if they left their country, but who presently remain in their country of origin. UNHCR thus has missions in Colombia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Serbia and Montenegro and Côte d\'Ivoire to assist and provide services to IDPs.
As of January 1, 2006 there are 20,751,900 refugees in the world. Asia - 8,603,600 Africa - 5,169,300 Europe - 3,666,700 Latin America and Caribbean - 2,513,000 North America - 716,800 Oceania - 82,500
Sometimes Refugees are discriminated in their own country, by foreign people and often sent away from their home
Power lines leading to a rubbish dump hover just overhead in El Carpio, a Nicaraguan refugee camp in Costa Rica
Refugees are a subgroup of the broader category of displaced persons. Environmental refugees (people displaced because of environmental problems such as drought) are not included in the definition of "refugee" under international law, as well as internally displaced people. According to international refugee law, a refugee is someone who seeks refuge in a foreign country because of war and violence, or out of fear of persecution "on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group" (to use the terminology from U.S. law).
Until a request for refuge has been accepted, the person is referred to as an asylum seeker. Only after the recognition of the asylum seeker\'s protection needs, he or she is officially referred to as a refugee and enjoys refugee status, which carries certain rights and obligations according to the legislation of the receiving country.
The practical determination of whether a person is a refugee or not is most often left to certain government agencies within the host country. This can lead to abuse in a country with a very restrictive official immigration policy; for example, that the country will neither recognize the refugee status of the asylum seekers nor see them as legitimate migrants and treat them as illegal aliens.
On the other hand, fraudulent requests in an environment of lax enforcement could lead to improper classification as refugee, resulting in the diversion of resources from those with a genuine need. The percentage of asylum/refugee seekers who do not meet the international standards of special-needs refugee, and for whom resettlement is deemed proper, varies from country to country. Failed asylum applicants are most often deported, sometimes after imprisonment or detention, as in the United Kingdom.
A claim for asylum may also be made onshore, usually after making an unauthorized arrival. Some governments are relatively tolerant and accepting of onshore asylum claims; other governments will not only refuse such claims, but may actually arrest or detain those who attempt to seek asylum.
Non-governmental organizations concerned with refugees and asylum seekers have pointed out difficulties for displaced persons to seek asylum in industrialized countries. As their immigration policy often focusses on the fight of irregular migration and the strengthening of border controls it deters displaced persons from entering territory in which they could lodge an asylum claim. The lack of opportunities to legally access the asylum procedures can force asylum seekers to undertake often expansive and hazardous attempts at illegal entry.
An estimated 80% of refugees are women and children. They often carry the heaviest burden of survival for themselves and their families. Women and adolescent girls in refugee settings are especially vulnerable to exploitation, rape, abuse and other forms of gender-based violence.
Children and youth constitute approximately 50 percent of all refugees worldwide. They are the deliberate targets of abuse, and easy prey to military recruitment and abduction. They typically miss out on years of education. More than 43 million children living in conflict-affected areas don’t have a chance to go to school.
Girls in particular face significant obstacles accessing education. Families who lack funds for school fees, uniforms, books, etc. are often influenced by cultural norms to prioritize education for boys over girls. Girls are typically pulled out of school before boys, often to help with traditional care-giving/work roles including care for younger siblings, gathering firewood and cooking. Early or forced marriage can also derail a girl’s education.
Without an education, refugee women and youth often struggle to support themselves and their families. With refugees displaced for longer periods of time than ever before (68% of all refugees are now displaced for an average of 17 years), the ability for refugees—particularly women and youth— to earn a living and sustain themselves and their families (“livelihoods”) is becoming even more critical. Livelihoods are vital for the social, emotional and economic well-being of displaced persons and are a key way to increase the safety of displaced women and adolescents. Lack of education, minimal job prospects, and disproportionate responsibility at home all limit the livelihood opportunities of women and youth.
On occasion, people who have been uprooted from their homes come to the United States in search of safe haven. They may be detained by the U.S. government, often until their asylum cases are decided—which can amount to days, weeks, months or even years. Many of those detained are women and children who seek asylum in the United States after fleeing from gender- and age-related persecution. Sometimes the children are alone, having fled abusive families or other human rights abuses. Detained women asylum seekers are also particularly vulnerable to abuse in detention. Women and children asylum seekers who reach the United States are often imprisoned and at times subjected to inhumane conditions, abuse and poor medical care, and denied legal representation and other services.
Refugee advocacy organizations, including the Women’s Commission For Refugee Women and Children, focus their programs and advocacy specifically on the needs of refugee women, children and youth.
Under international law, refugees are individuals who:
Refugee law encompasses both customary law, peremptory norms, and international legal instruments. These include:
A camp in Guinea for refugees from Sierra Leone.
A refugee camp is a place built by governments or NGOs (such as the ICRC) to receive refugees. People may stay in these camps, receiving emergency food and medical aid, until it is safe to return to their homes or until they get retrieved by other people outside the camps. In some cases, often after several years, other countries decide it will never be safe to return these people, and they are resettled in "third countries," away from the border they crossed.
However, more often than not, refugees are not resettled. Rather, they are "warehoused"-they are denied their basic human rights including the right of movement, employment, and ownership of property.
For 10, 20 or 40 years, men, women, and children have been confined to their camps-often arrested and deported to their native countries if they stray too far.
Camps are the breeding ground for disease, child soldiering, terrorist recruitment, and physical and sexual violence. And these camps are often funded by UNHCR and United States.[citation needed]
Globally, about 17 countries (Australia, Benin, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, the Republic of Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States [2]) regularly accept quota refugees from places such as refugee camps. Usually these are people who have escaped war. In recent years, most quota refugees have come from Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Liberia, Somalia, and Sudan, which have been in various wars and revolutions, and the former Yugoslavia, due to the Yugoslav wars.
According to Agence France-Presse, Japan accepted just ten people into the country as refugees in 2003, the lowest number since it let in just one in 1997. Despite denying them refugee status, Japan accepted 16 more people on special humanitarian grounds during the year -- also the lowest figure since 1997, when it accepted three. In contrast, 336 people applied for refugee status in Japan over the year, the highest figure in two years. Various international organisations, including the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, have asked Japan to accept more refugees.Japan\'s refugee policy
Japan accepted just 16 refugees in 1999, while the United States took in 85,010 for resettlement, according to the UNHCR. New Zealand, which is smaller than Japan, accepted 1,140 refugees in 1999. Amnesty International Japan said in January that the country is violating international refugee and anti-torture conventions, citing the case of an Iranian applicant who was arrested days after being deported in October. A Japanese court rejected the asylum request from a gay Iranian who faced the death penalty if his sexual orientation was discovered in his homeland.Questioning Japan\'s \'Closed Country\' Policy on Refugees
The term "boat people" came into common use in the 1970s with the mass exodus of Vietnamese refugees following the Vietnam War. It is a widely used form of migration for people migrating from Cuba, Haiti, Morocco, Vietnam or Albania. They often risk their lives on dangerously crude and overcrowded boats to escape oppression or poverty in their home nations. Events resulting from the Vietnam War led many people in Cambodia, Laos, and especially Vietnam to become refugees in the late 1970s and 1980s. In 2001, 353 asylum seekers sailing from Indonesia to Australia drowned when their vessel sank.
The main danger to a boat person is that the boat he or she is sailing in may actually be anything that floats and is large enough for passengers. Although such makeshift craft can result in tragedy, in 2003 a small group of 5 Cuban refugees attempted (unsuccessfully, but un-harmed) to reach Florida in a 1950s pickup truck made buoyant by oil barrels strapped to its sides.
Boat people are frequently a source of controversy in the nation they seek to immigrate to, such as the United States, Canada, Italy, Spain and Australia. Boat people are often forcibly prevented from landing at their destination, such as under Australia\'s Pacific Solution, or they are subjected to mandatory detention after their arrival.
For more details on this topic, see Palestinian refugees.
Following the 1948 proclamation of the State of Israel, the first Arab-Israeli War began. Many Palestinians had already become refugees, and the Palestinian Exodus (Nakba) continued through the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and after the armistice that ended it. The great majority have remained refugees for generations as they were not permitted to return to their homes or to settle in the Arab countries where they lived. The refugee situation and the presence of numerous refugee camps continues to be a point of contention in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The final estimate of refugee numbers was 711,000 according to the United Nations Conciliation Commission. Palestinian refugees from 1948 and their descendants do not come under the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, but under the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which created its own criteria for refugee classification. From the UNRWA web site:
Palestine refugees are persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict. UNRWA\'s services are available to all those living in its area of operations who meet this definition, who are registered with the Agency and who need assistance. UNRWA\'s definition of a refugee also covers the descendants of persons who became refugees in 1948.
As such they are the only refugee population legally defined to include descendants of refugees, as well as others who might otherwise be considered internally displaced persons.
As of December 2005, the World Refugee Survey of the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants estimates the total number of Palestinian refugees to be 2,966,100.
For more details on this topic, see Jewish refugees.
Between the first and second world wars, Jewish immigration to Palestine was encouraged by the nascent Zionist movement but was severely restricted by the British Mandate government in Palestine. In Europe, Nazi persecution culminated in the Holocaust and the mass murder of many European Jews. The Evian Conference, Bermuda Conference, and others failed to resolve the problem of finding a home for large numbers of Jewish refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe. Following its formation in 1948, Israel adopted the Law of Return, granting Israeli citizenship to any Jewish immigrant. Approximately 700,000 refugees flooded into the country, and were housed in tent cities called ma\'abarot. After the dissolution of the USSR, a second surge of 700,000 Russian Jews fled to Israel between 1990 and 1995.
Jews have lived in what are now Arab states at least since the Babylonian captivity (597 BCE). The refusal of the Arab world to accept the existence of a Jewish state led to discrimination and violence against the Jews. In 1948, the Arab League declared the Jews enemy citizens. Jewish bank accounts and property was confiscated, Jews were arrested and fired from their jobs, and synagogues were attacked. All I wanted was justice http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/941518.html In the early years after Israeli independence the number of Jews in Arab countries fell steeply: in Yemen, from 55,000 to 4,000; in Iraq from 135,000 to 6,000; in Aden from 8,000 to 800; in Egypt from 80,000 to 50,000; in Libya from 38,000 to 4,000; and in Syria from 30,000 to 5,000. All I wanted was justice http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/941518.html The plight of the Jews in Arab lands worsened following the 1967 Six-Day War, prompting the exodus of most of the remaining Jewish population. Very few Jews live in Arab countries today.
In 2007, similar resolutions (H.Res.185 and S.Res.85) were proposed to the US Senate and Congress, to:Make clear that the United States Government supports the position that, as an integral part of any comprehensive peace, the issue of refugees and the mass violations of human rights of minorities in Arab and Muslim countries throughout the Middle East, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf must be resolved in a manner that includes (A) consideration of the legitimate rights of all refugees displaced from Arab and Muslim countries throughout the Middle East, North Africa, and the Persian Gulf; and (B) recognition of the losses incurred by Jews, Christians, and other minority groups as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict. S. Res. 85
These resolutions were discussed on July 19th 2007 at the bicameral Congressional Human Rights Caucus in preparation for voting.
Since 2003, an estimated 10,000 migrants from various African countries have illegally entered Israel 1,000 Africans estimated to have infiltrated Israel in 2 weeks, Tani Goldstein, Published: 02.18.08, Ynet news. Some 600 Sudanese infiltrators, who escaped from Darfur (...) have received an official refugee status, which is granted following a government decision according to a United Nations recommendation. Another 2,000 infiltrators, who arrived from Eritrea, also received temporary resident IDs, for "humanitarian" reasons according to the government, but not as refugees. (...) Israel refuses to recognize them as refugees due to the Jewish state\'s good relations with both African countries.1,000 Africans estimated to have infiltrated Israel in 2 weeks, Tani Goldstein, Published: 02.18.08, Ynet news The remaining infiltrators live in Israel illegally.
The Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962) uprooted more than 2 million Algerians, who were forced to relocate in French camps or to flee to Morocco, Tunisia, and into the Algerian hinterland.
European-descended population,Pieds-Noirs, accounted for 10.4% of the total population of Algeria in 1962. In just a few months in 1962, 900,000 of them fled the country in the most massive relocation of population to Europe since the World War II. A motto used in the FLN propaganda designating the Pied-noirs community was "Suitcase or coffin" ("La valise ou le cercueil").On French immigrants, the words left unsaidFor Pieds-Noirs, the Anger Endures
It is estimated that some 900,000 people, representing one-fifth of the pre-war population, were displaced from their homes during the Lebanese Civil War (1975-90).Lebanon: Haven for foreign militants
It is estimated that more than 150,000 Sahrawis - people from the disputed territory of Western Sahara - have lived in five large refugee camps near Tindouf in the Algerian part of the Sahara Desert since 1975.EU donates €10 million to Western Sahara refugeesRefugees and internally displaced persons The UNHCR and WFP are presently engaged in supporting what they describe as the "90,000 most vulnerable" refugees, giving no estimate for total refugee numbers.Western Sahara: Lack of donor funds threatens humanitarian projects
The Nagorno Karabakh conflict has resulted in the displacement of 528,000 (this figure does not include new born children of these IDPs) Azerbaijanis from Armenian occupied territories including Nagorno Karabakh, and 220,000 Azeris and 18,000 Kurds fled from Armenia to Azerbaijan from 1988 to 1989.De Waal, Black Garden, p. 285 280,000 persons—virtually all ethnic Armenians—fled Azerbaijan during the 1988–1993 war over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.Refugees and displaced persons in Azerbaijan
Between 1984 and 1999, the PKK and the Turkish military engaged in open war, and much of the countryside in the southeast was depopulated, with Kurdish civilians moving to local defensible centers such as Diyarbakır, Van, and Şırnak, as well as to the cities of western Turkey and even to western Europe. The causes of the depopulation included PKK atrocities against Kurdish clans they could not control, the poverty of the southeast, and the Turkish state\'s military operations.Radu, Michael. (2001). "The Rise and Fall of the PKK", Orbis. 45(1):47-64. Human Rights Watch has documented many instances where the Turkish military forcibly evacuated villages, destroying houses and equipment to prevent the return of the inhabitants. An estimated 3,000 Kurdish villages in Turkey were virtually wiped from the map, representing the displacement of more than 378,000 people.Turkey: "Still Critical" - IntroductionDISPLACED AND DISREGARDED: Turkey\'s Failing Village Return ProgramProspects in 2005 for Internally Displaced Kurds in TurkeyHRW Turkey Reports
See also: Report D612, October, 1994, "Forced Displacement of Ethnic Kurds" (A Human Rights Watch Publication).
The Iran-Iraq war from 1980 to 1988, the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the first Gulf War and subsequent conflicts all generated hundreds of thousands if not millions of refugees. Iran also provided asylum for 1,400,000 Iraqi refugees who had been uprooted as a result of the Persian Gulf War (1990–91). At least one million Iraqi Kurds were displaced during the Al-Anfal Campaign (1986-1989).
The current Iraq war has generated millions of refugees and internally displaced persons. As of 2007 more Iraqis have lost their homes and become refugees than the population of any other country. Over 4,200,000 people, more than 16% of the Iraqi population, have become uprooted. Of these, about 2.2 million have fled Iraq and flooded other countries, and 2 million are estimated to be refugees inside Iraq, with nearly 100,000 Iraqis fleeing to Syria and Jordan each month.Iraq refugees chased from home, struggle to copeU.N.: 100,000 Iraq refugees flee monthly. Alexander G. Higgins, Boston Globe, November 3, 2006Anthony Arnove: Billboarding the Iraq disaster, Asia Times March 20, 2007
Roughly 40% of Iraq\'s middle class is believed to have fled, the U.N. said. Most are fleeing systematic persecution and have no desire to return. All kinds of people, from university professors to bakers, have been targeted by militias, insurgents and criminals. An estimated 331 school teachers were slain in the first four months of 2006, according to Human Rights Watch, and at least 2,000 Iraqi doctors have been killed and 250 kidnapped since the 2003 U.S. invasion.40% of middle class believed to have fled crumbling nation Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan live in impoverished communities with little international attention to their plight and little legal protection.Iraq\'s middle class escapes, only to find poverty in Jordan In Syria alone an estimated 50,000 Iraqi girls and women, many of them widows, are forced into prostitution just to survive.\'50,000 Iraqi refugees\' forced into prostitutionIraqi refugees forced into prostitution
According to Washington based Refugees International, out of the 4.2 million refugees fewer than 800 have been allowed into the US since the 2003 invasion. Sweden had accepted 18,000 and Australia had resettled almost 6,000.US in Iraq for \'another 50 years\', The Australian, June 2, 2007 As many as 110,000 Iraqis could be targeted as collaborators because of their work for coalition forces.Ambassador wants more visas for loyal Iraqis.
As of September 2007 Syria had decided to implement a strict visa regime to limit the number of Iraqis entering the country at up to 5,000 per day, cutting the only accessible escape route for thousands of refugees fleeing the civil war in Iraq. A government decree that took effect on 10 September 2007 bars Iraqi passport holders from entering Syria except for businessmen and academics. Until then, the Syria was the only country to had resisted strict entry regulations for Iraqis.Syria moves to restrain Iraqi refugee influxSyria to restricts Iraqi refugee influx
Although Assyrian Christians represent less than 5% of the total Iraqi population, they make up 40% of the refugees now living in nearby countries, according to U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.Christians, targeted and suffering, flee IraqTerror campaign targets Chaldean church in Iraq In the 16th century, Christians were half the population of Iraq.UNHCR |Iraq In 1987, the last Iraqi census counted 1.4 million Christians.Christians live in fear of death squads But as the current war has radicalized Islamic sensibilities, Christians have seen their total numbers slump to about 500,000 today, of whom 250,000 live in Baghdad.\'We\'re staying and we will resist\'
The US government position on refugees states that there is repression of religious minorities in the Middle East and in Pakistan such as Christians, Hindus, as well as Ahmadi, and Zikri denominations of Islam. In Sudan where Islam is the state religion, Muslims dominate the Government and restrict activities of Christians, practitioners of traditional African indigenous religions and other non-Muslims[3]. The question of Jewish, Christian and other refugees from Arab and Muslim countries was introduced in March 2007 in the US congress[4].
In the Islamic republic of Iran, Iranian Christians decry minority religions\' lack of freedom in Islamic countries [5], while Bahá\'ís are also fleeing religious persecution [6].
From the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 through the early 1990s, the Afghan War (1978–92) caused more than six million refugees to flee to the neighboring countries of Pakistan and Iran, making Afghanistan the greatest refugee-producing country. At the peek of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, close to seven million Afghan refugees sought refuge within Pakistan, making Pakistan the only country to have hosted such a huge number of refugees. The number of refugees fluctuated with the waves of the war, with thousands more fleeing after the Taliban takeover of 1996. The U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and continued ethnic cleansing and reprisals also caused additional displacement. Though there has been some repatriation sponsored by the U.N. from Iran and Pakistan, a 2007 UNHCR census identified over two million Afghan refugees still living in Pakistan alone.
Since late April 2007, the Iranian government has forcibly deported back to Afghanistan nearly 100,000 registered and unregistered Afghans living and working in Iran. The forceful evictions of the refugees, who have lived in Iran and Pakistan for nearly three decades, are part of the two countries\' larger plans to repatriate all Afghan refugees within a few years. Iran says it will send one million by next March, and Pakistan announced that all 2,400,000 Afghan refugees, most living in camps, must return home by 2009. Experts say it will be \'disastrous\' for Afghanistan.Iranian Deportations Raise Fears of Humanitarian Crisis in AfghanistanTo root out Taliban, Pakistan to expel 2.4 million Afghans
The partition of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan in 1947 resulted in the largest human movement in history: an exchange of 18,000,000 Hindus and Sikhs (from Bangladesh-65% and Pakistan-35% ) for Muslims (from India). During the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, owing to the West Pakistani Army\'s Operation Searchlight, more than ten million Bengalis fled to neighboring India.
As a result of the Bangladesh Liberation War, on 27 March 1971, Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi, expressed full support of her Government to the Bangladeshi struggle for freedom. The Bangladesh-India border was opened to allow panic-stricken Bengalis safe shelter in India. The governments of West Bengal, Bihar, Assam, Meghalaya and Tripura established refugee camps along the border. Exiled Bangladeshi army officers and the Indian military immediately started using these camps for recruitment and training members of Mukti Bahini. During the Bangladesh War of Independence around 10 million Bengalis fled the country to escape the killings and atrocities committed by the Pakistan Army. Following the war, the Bangladesh government and actively supported by the Indian military indiscriminately tortured and killed thousands of Biharis who were mostly against the independence of Bangladesh. Those who survived the massacre were forced into squalid camps were they live to this day. There are between 126,000 and 159,000 Biharis who have been living in camp-like situations in Bangladesh ever since the war.
There are more than 150,000 Tibetans who live in India, many in settlements in Dharamsala and Mysore, and Nepal. These include people who have escaped over the Himalayas from Tibet, as well as their children and grandchildren. In India the overwhelming majority of Tibetans born in India are still stateless and carry a document called an Identity Card issued by the Indian government in lieu of a passport. This document states the nationality of the holder as Tibetan. It is a document that is frequently rejected as a valid travel document by many customs and immigrations departments.
In 1991-92, Bhutan expelled roughly 100,000 ethnic Nepalis, most of whom have been living in seven refugee camps in eastern Nepal ever since. Talks are ongoing to resettle them in third countries, most notably the U.S.
Meanwhile, as many as 200,000 Nepalese were displaced during the Maoist insurgency and Nepalese Civil War which ended in 2006.
The civil war in Sri Lanka (1983 to the present) has generated millions of internally displaced as well as refugees. Sri Lanka Tamils have fled to India, Europe (mostly France, Denmark, the United Kingdom, and Germany), and Canada (over 800,000 people).
Displacement of Kashmiri Hindus living in Kashmir due to the ongoing anti-Indian insurgency. Some 300,000 Hindus have been internally displaced from Kashmir due to the violence.India, The World Factbook. Retrieved 20 May 2006.
Since 1991, much of the country\'s non-Muslim population, including Russians and Jews, has fled Tajikistan due to severe poverty, instability and Tajikistan Civil War (1992–1997).Russians left behind in Central Asia, by Robert Greenall, BBC News, 23 November 2005. In 1992, most of the country’s Jewish population was evacuated to Israel.For Jews in Tajikistan, the end of history is looming By the end of the civil war Tajikistan was in a state of complete devastation. Around 1.2 million people were refugees inside and outside of the country.Tajikistan: rising from the ashes of civil war United Nations
In 1989, after bloody pogroms against the Meskhetian Turks in Central Asia\'s Ferghana Valley, nearly 90,000 Meskhetian Turks left Uzbekistan.Focus on Mesketian TurksMeskhetian Turk Communities around the World
Following the communist takeovers in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos in 1975, about three million people attempted to escape in the subsequent decades. With massive influx of refugees daily, the resources of the receiving countries were severely strained. The plight of the boat people became an international humanitarian crisis. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) set up refugee camps in neighboring countries to process the boat people. The budget of the UNHCR increased from $80 million in 1975 to $500 million in 1980. Partly for its work in Indochina, the UNHCR was awarded the 1981 Nobel Peace Prize.
Since the 1950s, many nations in Africa have suffered civil wars and ethnic strife, thus generating a massive number of refugees of many different nationalities and ethnic groups. The division of Africa into European colonies in 1885, along which lines the newly independent nations of the 1950s and 1960s drew their borders, has been cited as a major reason why Africa has been so plagued with intrastate warfare. The number of refugees in Africa increased from 860,000 in 1968 to 6,775,000 by 1992 (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2004). By the end of 2004, that number had dropped to 2,748,400 refugees, according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees [10]. (That figure does not include internally displaced persons, who do not cross international borders and so do not fit the official definition of refugee.)
Many refugees in Africa cross into neighboring countries to find haven; often, African countries are simultaneously countries of origin for refugees and countries of asylum for other refugees. The Democratic Republic of Congo, for instance, was the country of origin for 462,203 refugees at the end of 2004, but a country of asylum for 199,323 other refugees.
Countries in Africa from where 5,000 or more refugees originated as of the end of 2004, arranged in descending order of numbers of refugees are listed below. (UNHCR,
