UN refugee chief calls for return to peacemaking to stem flows
There are 110 million displaced people around the world, up from 103 million last year and half that number a decade ago
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The world needs to rediscover its ability to bring peace to various trouble spots in order to curb the growing flow of refugees, the head of the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said on Tuesday.
There are 110 million displaced people around the world, up from 103 million last year and half that number a decade ago. "The U.N. Security Council, the main international body for peace and security, is broken. They cannot agree on anything," the U.N.'s High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi told Reuters in the Kenyan capital.
"So we need to restore that capacity to lead, to drive peace because that is the only way we can address these flows." A group of diplomats, former statesmen and U.N. officials began seeking political backing for a peacemaking framework earlier this year to shape new standards for resolving conflicts.
Among the drivers behind the higher numbers of refugees, which include the internally displaced, is the conflict in Sudan, where rival military factions are battling each other. "Today, right on World Refugee Day, we passed this horrible mark of 500,000 refugees from Sudan," Grandi said.
Donors pledged $1.5 billion to help the Sudanese refugees at a conference on Monday. Some of the cash will be used to help 100,000 Sudanese refugees in neighbouring Chad whose camps are threatened by the onset of the rain season, the high commissioner said.
"It is a very desperate race against time," he added. He called for a more sustainable solution like a meaningful ceasefire.
"If the fighting doesn't stop, this is just the beginning. We will need much more than $1.5 billion, unfortunately," he said. Other reasons for the higher number of refugees include the conflicts in Ukraine, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan and the Sahel.
Challenges emanating from climate change are also forcing people to move, Grandi said, calling for a multilateral approach to tackling the climate crisis. "The time for working country by country is over," he said.