World Refugee Day (20/06)

«This is not a burden-sharing issue. This is a question of sharing global responsibility, not only taking into account the broad idea of our common belonging to the human race, but also taking into account very specific international legal responsibilities. The source of problems is war and hatred, not people fleeing them; refugees are among the first to become victims of terrorism. From the message of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

Every year on June 20, the world community celebrates World Refugee Day, approved by the UN General Assembly (resolution 55/76) in 2000.

Over the years, various countries and regions have celebrated their own commemorative days and even weeks dedicated to refugees. One of the most famous is African Refugee Day, which is celebrated in several countries on June 20.

In 2000, the UN General Assembly unanimously adopted a special resolution — expressing solidarity with Africa, which hosts a large number of refugees and traditionally shows its generosity towards them. Pursuant to this resolution, the General Assembly celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees in 2001. At the same time, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) agreed that World Refugee Day be celebrated simultaneously with African Refugee Day — on June 20.

Refugees and internally displaced persons are defined as persons who have fled their countries on grounds of a justified fear of persecution because of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership of a particular social group who are unable or unwilling to return. Many people become refugees due to wars, natural disasters or man-made disasters.

Today's date — is a statement of fact: wars on earth do not stop. This is also a statement of international agreements on which the protection of refugees and respect for the fortitude and courage of refugees around the world are based.

According to international law, — refugees are people who cannot or do not want to return to their countries, to their native lands due to well-founded fears of becoming a victim of persecution.

There are currently approximately 22.5 million refugees and 25 million internally displaced persons registered on the planet. Every minute, 24 people leave their homes due to wars, persecution or fear for their lives. 80% of all refugees in the world — are women and children. A quarter of the world's refugees come from Syria and Iraq. The conflict in Syria has forced 11 million people to flee their homes.

According to the Department of Information and Press of the Russian Foreign Ministry, the bulk of refugees are in Africa, in the Afghan conflict zone, and in the Balkans. According to the Federal Migration Service of the Russian Federation, in the period from 2008 to 2013, from one thousand to three thousand people a year from different countries applied for asylum in Russia every year. And after the outbreak of the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine in April 2014, refugees from this country began to arrive in Russia. According to the Federal Migration Service of the Russian Federation, there are a total of about 4 million Ukrainian citizens in Russia (at the end of 2022).

Moreover, this situation concerns not only Russia, the flow of refugees to European countries, the USA and Canada is also large. All these facts make the refugee problem one of the most pressing in the modern world.

In a world where violence forces hundreds of families to flee their homes every day, support from the global community must be shown. And the international community is consolidating its efforts to alleviate the plight of these people. Established in 1950, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is now the central international agency making efforts to meet this challenge.

In 2016, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees launched the #WithRefugees initiative to sign a petition calling on governments to work collectively and share responsibility for the fate of refugees. The petition calls on governments to ensure refugee children have access to education, refugee families have a safe place to live, and provide every refugee with access to jobs or new skills.

The Russian Federation, at the international level, also contributes to solving problems related to refugees. Russia also cooperates with UNHCR on issues of assistance to internally displaced persons and on issues of internal migration that Russia directly faces. The Russian Foreign Ministry also notes that cooperation brings concrete and tangible results.

Every year, World Refugee Day is dedicated to a specific topic. So, the mottos of the day in different years were: «A place that can be called home», «Supporting the flame of hope», «Real people — real needs», «Take a minute to feed the family of forced refugees», «Every action matters» and others.



Infographics – poster «June 20 — World Refugee Day»

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