The Global Refugee Crisis
International Crisis Group - 12 April 2016 - The Board of Trustees of the International Crisis Group calls on world leaders to take more coordinated, better principled action to address the global refugee crisis. The scale of the tragedy shines the spotlight on just how remiss the international order has been in managing, much less settling, the conflicts that generate so much of today’s human flight.
By many indicators, deadly conflict is on the rise: the concurrent spike in flight is no coincidence. The Syrian war alone has dislodged twelve million people, raising the global number of refugees and internally displaced to 60 million, the largest figure ever. More than half the world’s approximately 20 million refugees come from just three conflict-ravaged countries – Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia.
Left unaddressed, this crisis threatens worse. For frontline states such as Lebanon and Jordan, Turkey and Greece, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Tanzania, the economic, social, human rights, political and security implications of rapid, massive influxes of people are overwhelming. The failure to address the situation risks further conflict, triggering further refugee flows. The cost to future generations is no less alarming; among all child refugees globally some 50 per cent receive no schooling.