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The Global Refugee Crisis

The Global Refugee Crisis. Key Terms.

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The Global Refugee Crisis

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  1. The Global Refugee Crisis

  2. Key Terms • Refugee: A person who leaves his or her country due to a well-founded fear of persecution because of his or her race, religion, nationality, political views, or membership in a particular social group. People fleeing conflicts are also generally considered to be refugees since they are seeking refuge (safety). Refugees have specific rights and protections under international law. For example, refugees have the right to not be forced to return to the unsafe situation that they fled. Refugees have the rights of security and freedom of movement. They have the right to keep their family together. Similarly, countries that have refugees seeking asylum in their territory have specific responsibilities under international law for the treatment of those refugees.

  3. Migrant: A person who moves to a foreign country for various reasons—for example, for employment, education, or to reunite with family—usually for a year or more. Unlike refugees, migrants do not face a direct threat of persecution or death in their home country. • Internally Displaced Person (IDP): A person who is forcibly uprooted within his or her country but who has not crossed an international border. IDPs may be forced from their home as a result of armed conflict, human rights violations, or natural or human-made disasters, yet remain in their country.

  4. Host Country: The country to which a refugee relocates. • Asylum: Shelter or protection from danger granted by a country to someone forced to leave their home country. • Asylum Seeker: A person who has moved across international borders in search of protection and filed a claim for asylum with the host country’s government. While the government reviews the claim, the person remains an asylum seeker. If the claim is accepted, the person becomes a “refugee” in the eyes of the government. For example, someone from Syria who is living in Germany and waiting to hear the outcome of his or her asylum application would be considered an asylum seeker.

  5. The Syrian Refugee Crisis

  6. History • Syria was part of the Ottoman Empire for 400 years, from the early 1500s to the early 1900s. • A period of French colonial rule (1918-1946) ended with Syrian independence. • The next 20 years saw multiple coups, and a brief unity with Egypt. • In 1963, the Ba’ath party took over the government, installing a secular and socialist Arab regime. • The new government purged dissenters, nationalized banks, implemented land reform to give land to peasants, and Arabized the educational curriculum.

  7. In 1970, the Minister of Defense, Hafez al-Assad, seized power, and in 1971 made himself president. • He created a legislative body, introduced a new constitution, and rigged elections that kept him in power and ensured Ba’ath party dominance. • The government cultivated close ties with the USSR, the former Eastern Bloc, and Iran. • In 2000, after 30 years of rule, Hafez al-Assad passed away and was succeeded by his son, Bashar al-Assad, a British-trained eye doctor who remains in power today. • Under Bashar al-Assad, authoritarian rule under one party and one ruler continued. • Like his father, Assad placed family members in positions of power.

  8. Political repression and governmental corruption and mismanagement did not end, however, and most Syrians continued to feel oppressed by the Assad regime and Ba’ath party political control. • The 2011 uprising began as peaceful protests after the government arrested—and reportedly tortured—schoolchildren who had written anti-government graffiti on a wall in Daraa.

  9. Protestors called for reforms, and the Syrian government responded to the demonstrations as it had in the past, with widespread arrests, beatings by plainclothes government forces, brutal interrogations and torture, and the use of live ammunition and snipers to terrify and kill street protestors. • The people, however, remained on the streets and began organizing in different ways against the regime. Since the start of the crisis, the Syrian government has referred to protesters and their family members and sympathizers as terrorists.

  10. By June 2011, an estimated 1,400 people had been killed and over 10,000 arrested by the regime. • That summer, the Free Syrian Army (FSA) was formed primarily by defectors from the Syrian military, and the fighting to liberate Syria from the Assad regime spread across the country. Islamist fighters joined the uprising. • By 2013, over 1,000 individual brigades, loosely organized into frequently changing networks, were fighting the Syrian government. • Islamist extremists, including factions based in Iraq, took advantage of the instability and joined in, fighting both the regime and the FSA at different times. • One of the foreign factions, the militant Sunni group Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), established a base in eastern Syria. From there it launched an attack and takeover of western Iraq in 2014.

  11. Civilians and nonviolent activists have paid a heavy toll in the conflict. • Since 2011, more than 191,000 people have been killed, and millions driven from their homes. • Men, women, and children have suffered extreme trauma or witnessed it. • It is estimated that half of Syria’s population is no longer living in their homes, with 6.5 million people internally displaced in Syria, and 3 million registered as refugees in neighboring countries.

  12. Syria’s War: Who is Fighting and Why • Syria in Five Minutes • Understanding the Refugee Crisis in Europe, Syria and Around the World

  13. A Humanitarian Crisis • The Syria conflict has triggered the world's largest humanitarian crisis since World War II. Humanitarian needs are huge, population displacement persists and fighting continues in the country. • Civilians continue to be the primary victims of the conflict. Rape and sexual violence, enforced disappearances, forcible displacement, recruitment of child soldiers, summary executions and deliberate targeting of civilian places and infrastructure essential for people’s survival have become commonplace.

  14. "This is the biggest refugee population from a single conflict in a generation. It is a population that deserves the support of the world but is instead living in dire conditions and sinking deeper into abject poverty.” UN High Commissioner for Refugees AntónioGuterres, July 9, 2015.

  15. The magnitude of humanitarian needs is overwhelming in all parts of Syria. • The main priorities are treating the wounded and sick, providing food aid, water, sanitation and hygiene, shelter, fuel for heating and winter items. • Prices of basic commodities have been rising and the availability of food stocks in many parts of Syria is at risk. • Shelter needs are prevalent with over 11 million people having fled their homes from inside Syria to the neighbouring countries. • Children, women and the elderly are most at risk.

  16. The World’s Response A Twofold Response: Aid in place or resettlement to a third country. Humanitarian Aid: • In 2015 UNHCR requested almost 7.5 billion for activities inside Syria and in neighboring countries. • 35% of the needed funds have been pledged by donor countries. Resettlement: • Resettlement countries have offered 88,000 places for refugees since 2013. Just under 2000 refugees departed the region for third countries in 2014. *Associated Press and UNHCR

  17. A Shared Responsibility • Countries in the region and in Europe have so far taken the lion’s share of responsibility for hosting and resettling refugees. • Turkey is currently hosting almost 2 million refugees; over 1 million Syrian refugees are in Lebanon; more than 600,000 are living in Jordan and over 100,000 refugees have taken refuge in Egypt. • Germany expects to take in as many as 1 million asylum seekers this year. Thousands of Germans have pledged to help the refugees arriving to their communities. • Canada and Australia have committed to resettling over 15,000 refugees between them.

  18. Video: Stranded in Hungary

  19. Why Resettlement Matters • Resettlement saves refugee lives when no other protection is available. • When individuals flee persecution, they commonly have three avenues for protection: Repatriation, Local Integration and Resettlement. In fact, many refugees languish for years in precarious circumstances either in camps or on their own. Most refugees want to go home. Some refugees can start anew in countries where they seek refuge. But not all of them can. • Of the millions of refugees worldwide, a small number – around 1% - is resettled to a third country. The first country is the refugee’s homeland; the second country is the place where an individual first takes refuge; when refugees are resettled, they are taken in by a third country. • Resettlement from countries where refugees first flee helps boost international support for refugee assistance – both material and protection. Countries are more likely to help refugees if they know the world will help shoulder the responsibility.

  20. Refugee Processing: A Rigorous And Secure Process • Refugee applicants undergo rigorous security screenings. Security screening starts at the beginning of the application process and results are continuously updated. • Refugees are fingerprinted and photographed and their information checked against numerous security databases. Checks occur multiple times. • UNHCR has gathered sophisticated biometric data such as iris scans on many of the refugees that may apply for admission to their host country. • The process is thorough and lengthy – it can take 1000 days for security screening and other processes to be completed.

  21. How a Refugee Gets to America

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