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Number of forcibly displaced people hits 51 million, highest since WWII: UNHCR

Escalating crises in Syria and parts of Africa have pushed the number of forcibly displaced people to the highest level since World War Two, the United Nations says.

United Nation's High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) says it is dealing with multiple refugee crises, making 2013 one of the most challenging years in its history.

The level of human displacement is the highest on record with 51.2 million people counted as refugees, asylum-seekers or internally displaced people by the end of last year - six million more than what was reported the year before.


"During 2013, UNHCR also identified close to 3.5 million stateless persons in 75 countries, and estimated the total number of stateless persons worldwide at more than 10 million," the report said.

"Afghanistan, the Syrian Arab Republic, and Somalia were the top three source countries of refugees at the end of 2013, together accounting for more than half (53 per cent) of all refugees under UNHCR's responsibility."

The UN body says if the displaced people were a nation, they would make up the 26th largest country in the world.

The UNHCR says the primary cause of the increase is the escalating crises in Syria, South Sudan and the Central African Republic.

"We are really facing a quantum leap, an enormous increase of forced displacement in our world," UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres told a news briefing.

Nearly 17 million people are refugees and a record 33.3 million people are internally displaced.

"The war in the Syrian Arab Republic, entering into its third year in 2013, was the primary cause of these outflows," the report said.

"The Syrian Arab Republic had moved from being the world's second largest refugee-hosting country to being its second largest refugee-producing country – within a span of just five years."

With Syria alone, the UNHCR says 2.5 million refugees have crossed into neighbouring Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq and Jordan and 6.5 million people are internally displaced.

The UN body is calling on the international community to overcome its differences and help resolve the world's conflicts.

"We are seeing here the immense costs of not ending war, of failing to resolve or prevent conflict," Mr Guterres said.


Developing countries harbour most refugees: UN

Most refugees have found shelter in developing countries, contrary to the myth fuelled by some populist politicians in the West that their states were being flooded, Mr Guterres said.


"The truth is that 86 per cent of the world's refugees live in the developing world."


Antonio Guterres


Italy will ask the European Union next week to take over responsibility for rescuing migrants, a task that is costing its navy 9 million euros ($13 million) a month.

"It is important to have a European commitment there and to make sure that such an operation can be sustainable," said Mr Guterres, a former prime minister of Portugal.



"We see a growing number of unaccompanied minors on all routes," Mr Guterres said.

"We see them in the Mediterranean routes, we see them in the Caribbean route, through Mexico to the United States, we see them in the Afghan route into Iran, into Turkey, into Europe. We see them everywhere."


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