There are 258m international migrants: UN

United Nations, Dec. 19: An estimated 258 million people have left their birth countries and are now living in other nations an increase of 49 per cent since 2000, says a UN Report on international migration released Monday.

The biennial report released on International Migrants Day said the percentage of the world’s people who are international migrants has increased modestly from 2.8 percent in 2000 to 3.4 percent this year.

But the report from the UN department of economic and social affairs said the percentage living in high- income countries rose from 9.6 percent in 2000 to 14 percent in 2017.

“Reliable data and evidence are critical to combat misperceptions about migration and to inform migration policies,” said Undersecretary- General for economic and social affairs Liu Zhenmin.

In September 2016, all 193 UN Member states, including the United States under President Barack Obama, adopted the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants. It said no one country can manage international migration on its own.

The countries agreed to implement well- managed migration policies and committed to sharing more equitably the burden of hosting refugees.

They also agreed to protect the human rights of migrants and to counter xenophobia and intolerance toward migrants. They further agreed to launch a process leading to the adoption of a global compact in 2018.