UNITED NATIONS, Jun 12 2019 (IPS)* – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has been forced to justify its existence at the United Nations ahead of a pledging conference later this month.
UNRWA came under fire by Jason Greenblatt, US Special Envoy for International Negotiations, at a Security Council meeting late last month.
Allegations and criticism raised by Greenblatt did little to aid the already precarious financial situation of the Agency. Last week, UNRWA held a press conference at the UN in an attempt to raise awareness — and funds for their work.
12 June 2019 (UNHCR)* — UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is concerned at a recent decree from the Government of Italy that contains several provisions affecting refugees and migrants, including fines for NGO vessels engaged in saving lives at sea.
Bogotá, 11 June 2019 (IOM)* – #TuVidaCambia (Your Life Changes) awareness raising campaign has been launched in Colombia to protect Venezuelan migrants and refugees from falling prey to trafficking and smuggling networks.
The band performing in Cucuta, a Colombian city on the border with Venezuela. Photo: IOM
This is a common danger Venezuelans face as they migrate through Colombia, as they seek places to settle, or while in transit to other South American destinations, including like Chile, Ecuador and Perú.
French authorities have harassed, intimidated and even violently assaulted people offering humanitarian aid and other support to migrants, asylum seekers and refugees in northern France in a deliberate attempt to curtail acts of solidarity, a new report by Amnesty International has found.
6 June 2019 (UNHCR)* — When Abu Sayed, father of six, thinks about the future of his children, he breaks down and weeps.
“My life is almost gone. If they cannot have an education, they will be ignorant,” he says, sitting in his family’s bamboo shelter in the vast Kutupalong refugee settlement, the largest in the world.
Migrants and refugees suffering from tuberculosis are being left “effectively to die” in a Libyan detention centre south of Tripoli, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, said on Friday [7 June 2019], citing reports that those returned to shore by the coastguard have been disappeared or sold to traffickers.
Cox’s Bazar, 17 May 2019 (IOM)* –Under clear 36-degree Celsius skies, an exhausted Rafiq leans against his house, surrounded by his five children. Glancing upwards, he ponders another sweltering walk down a steep dirt path to haul clean water for his family.
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Rohingya refugees at a shallow well in Cox’s Bazar.
A pump just nearby provides water whose drinkability he views as “unreliable” and requires an arduous hillside trek. Sterilizing water by boiling also is difficult because firewood is hard to come by.
The critical needs of 1.2 million mostly Rohingya refugees in south-eastern Bangladesh were top of the agenda for a fact-finding mission to the region by three senior United Nations officials, who called for continuing support on Friday [26 April 2019] for them from the international community.
At the end of a joint visit to the country, UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Lowcock, head of UN migration agency (IOM) António Vitorino, and UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Filippo Grandi, reiterated their commitment to find safe and sustainable solutions for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, as well as helping them to make a safe and dignified return home.
19 April 2019 (UNHCR)* — UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, has evacuated some 163 refugees from Libya to Niger in the first such flight since fighting escalated in the Libyan capital two weeks ago. The flight landed early on Friday [19 April 2019].
10 April 2019 (Norwegian Refugee Council)* — “Knowing I contribute to put food on the table and feed the children of other refugee families makes it worth the effort I put into my cooking,” says Syrian Khitam. Together with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), she provides meals for 300 families affected by the winter storms in Lebanon.
Khitam is a 54-year-old woman from Syria and lives in one of the biggest refugee settlements in Lebanon, together with more than 1,500 refugees. She is one of seven refugee women cooking meals that are distributed to the refugees living in this and other settlements. Photo: Racha El Daoi/NRC
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 