The elections last month in Central African Republic brought a fresh wave of political violence affecting more than 200,000 people who are now displaced, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). “The continuing volatility has hampered the humanitarian response and made access to the internally displaced more…
Ioane Teitiota of the Pacific Island nation of Kiribati lost his individual case, but the landmark ruling on the rights of climate refugees from the United Nations Human Rights Committee means he may have changed the future for people seeking to escape the extreme impacts of a warming world. That…
A new report on the world’s refugees finds the number of people fleeing their homes because of conflict, persecution or other harrowing circumstances exceeded 70 million in 2018 – and it’s the highest level in almost 70 years. That’s according to UNHCR, the United Nations refugee agency, which released its…
In the United States, Somali American Ilhan Omar – a representative serving the state of Minnesota in the U.S. Congress – has been under fire for the past month because of comments she’s made about U.S. foreign policy toward Israel that many have interpreted as anti-Semitic. Despite a legislative resolution…
Somali-American Ilhan Omar was sworn into office on Thursday, and is now representing the state of Minnesota as one of two Muslim women who are the first to serve in the United States Congress. Omar is one of more than 100 women who are now members of the 116th Congress,…
Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), warned Friday that Angola’s deportation of Congolese nationals is resulting in serious human rights violations by security forces on both sides of the border. Some 330,000 people have crossed from Angola back into the troubled Kasai and Kwango provinces…
Officials in Angola defended on Tuesday the closure of 67 illegal diamond mine operations as part of its “Operation Transparency” crackdown, a National Police effort in seven provinces meant to curb illegal mining and migration. Police spokesman António Bernardo told state news agency ANGOP that some 260 Congolese migrants left…
Human traffickers in Libya reportedly killed more than a dozen people and wounded many others after a group of some 200 Eritreans, Ethiopians and Somalis attempted to escape captivity, UNHCR said on Friday. The United Nations refugee agency said the incident happened May 23 in Bani Walid, about 180 kilometers…
Global human rights organization Amnesty International is again pressuring European Union nations to change its policies on migration from Libya, where thousands of refugees and migrants are trapped in shocking conditions. That message comes as EU officials said Wednesday that the central Mediterranean transit numbers remain much lower, but the…
Cameroon continues to return Nigerian refugees and asylum seekers entering the country’s far north region in what the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says is a violation of the international principle of non-refoulement. Some 385 Nigerians have been forcibly returned by the Cameroonian government, despite the fact that…
With thousands of Congolese refugees streaming across the border into neighboring Zambia, the government in Lusaka announces a new permanent refugee settlement facility will open in the Mantapala area of Nchelenge District, near Lake Mweru in the country’s far north. The center will open soon to relieve congestion at Kenani,…
Government forces in the DR Congo have been implicated in waves of increasing ethnic violence in the Kasai provinces, according to a United Nations investigation report released Friday. The report, based on interviews with Congolese seeking refuge in neighboring Angola, details their horrific accounts of targeted killings and mutilation of…
Renewed fighting in May between rebel forces in the Central African Republic (CAR) has forced another 88,000 people from their homes, the United Nations refugee agency said Tuesday. The growing number of refugees includes more than 20,000 people who have fled into the Democratic Republic of Congo, many of them…
More than 4,000 Congolese have crossed the border into Angola since Wednesday, seeking refuge from the fighting between Kamuina Nsapu rebels and government forces in the southern Kasai region of Democratic Republic of Congo. That’s according to figures provided on Saturday by the DR Congo consulate in Moshico, cited by…
The International Organization for Migration said Friday that 27,850 migrants and refugees entered Europe via the Mediterranean Sea through March of this year, over 80 percent arriving in Italy. The numbers show a dramatic drop from the same period last year, when there were more than 165,000 such crossings, but…