UN refugee body warns of cuts unless $700M received by year-end

ANKARA

Head of the UN refugee body Flippo Grandi has warned that unless the UNHCR receives additional funds it will have to make cuts.

“If we do not receive at least an additional US$700 million, especially for our most underfunded operations, between now and the end of this year, we will be forced to make severe cuts with negative and sometimes drastic consequences for refugees and host communities,” Grandi told the UNHCR’s annual Executive Committee meeting in Geneva on Monday.

The action is also needed for internally displaced people, he added.

Referring to the refugee influx to Europe caused by Russia’s war in Ukraine, Grandi said the war has shown Europe is capable of taking refugees.

“We must not accept the denial of access to territory for those seeking asylum, often through violent pushbacks; we must not normalize attempts to outsource asylum responsibilities,” Grandi said.

“I also reject what we have heard some politicians on this continent tell their voters: that Ukrainians are ‘real refugees’ while others – fleeing similar horrors, but from different parts of the world – are not. There is only one word to define this attitude: racist,” he added.

Grandi also said the UNHCR cannot only pay attention to one conflict and ignore the rest, noting that millions of people in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Rohingya, and Syria are in need of help “with resources lagging far behind their needs.”