Refugees and UNHCR

UNHCR Regional Office for the United States and the Caribbean

History1921 - Nansen named 1st High Commissioner for Refugees

1945 WWII ends with 3 million refugees still homeless

1950 UNHCR is founded

1951 Refugee Convention is adopted

1950-60s Hungarian, Algerian, Tibetan, and Rwandan outflows

1975 SE Asia exodus begins

1980s Afghan, Ethiopian, Iranian, Central American outflows

1990s Bosnian, Liberian, Rwandan, Somali, & Sudanese outflows

2000s Darfuri, Iraqi, & Congolese outflows

2012-2013 1 million + Syrians flee

Who is a refugee?Of the 7,000,000,000 persons in the world15,000,000+ are refugees.

Refugee A universal definition Article (1) 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of RefugeesA refugee is any person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecutedfor reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion,is outside of his country of nationality, and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country

Rights of Refugees

Durable solutionsRepatriationLocal IntegrationResettlement

Steps for Refugee ResettlementRefugee status determinationor registration processIdentification of aneed for resettlementResettlement country refugee status determinationand admissibilityproceduresClearancesTravelReception & IntegrationSubmission

How Refugees Access the US Resettlement ProgramIndividual Referrals byUS EmbassiesUNHCROverseas NGOs Designated groups ofconcern to the USFamily Reunion

Nationalities of refugeesresettled to the US in 2012

Chart1

15070

14160

12160

4911

1948

1863

1758

7951

Arrivals

Sheet1

Arrivals

Bhutan15,070

Burma14,160

Iraq12,160

Somalia4,911

Cuba1948

Congo-DRC1863

Iran1758

All others7951

Nationalities of persons granted asylum in the US in 2012

Chart1

11463

2333

820

819

790

759

682

616

518

12394

Column1

Sheet1

Column1

China11,463

Egypt2333

Nepal820

Haiti819

Venezuela790

Iran759

Russia682

Guatemala616

Cameroon518

All others12394

More information on refugees

WWW.UNHCR.ORG

Data.UNHCR.org

UNHCR Refworld

WWW.UNHCRWASHINGTON.ORG

Refugee Processing Center www.wrapsnet.org

Office of Refugee Resettlement -http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/orr/

Center for Applied Linguistics - www.cal.org

Thank you!

*1 out 700 persons in the world is a refugee.