Agency: Nearly 69M forcibly displaced
Solutions remain elusive on World Refugee Day
PARIS — Lined up before dawn, dozens of migrants outside a government office in Italy jostled to be one of the handful allowed inside to request asylum Wednesday.
The journeys that brought them to Rome and the sleepless nights wondering if they would be allowed to stay was being repeated in cities and countries around the world on World Refugee Day as millions of people sought to flee persecution, violence, war and poverty.
The Rohingya Muslims forced out of Myanmar to Bangladesh; teenagers from Mexico and Central America seeking safety in the United States; Syria’s war refugees; men from South Sudan and Nigeria crossing the Mediterranean Sea to feed their families — they are among the human wave roiling every continent.
“The international community must work with shared and longterm political choices to manage a phenomenon that involves the entire world,” Italian President Sergio Mattarella, whose country is on the receiving end of Europe’s immigration front line, said in a World Refugee Day message.
While migration to the world’s 35 richest countries dropped slightly last year for the first time since 2011, asylum claims rose by 26 percent in the United States, according to a new report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which represents the wealthy nations.
Meanwhile, the United Nations refugee agency reported this week that nearly 69 million people were forcibly displaced in 2017, a record for the fifth straight year.
OECD Secretary-general Angel Gurria insisted that since migration is here to stay, countries need to work to integrate newcomers and to prepare their native-born populations to welcome foreigners instead of resent them.
He noted that while “fears about the impact of refugees on jobs in OECD countries are simply at odds with the facts,” young men with limited educations in places like Germany and Austria could be disproportionally affected by an expanded labor force and deserve attention and training.