Kemal Kirişci writes: As the world commemorates the 70th anniversary of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees this week, the global refugee picture continues to deteriorate. According to the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), in 2020 an additional 1.4 million individuals “sought protection outside their country of origin” despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on travel. The conflict in the Tigray province of Ethiopia, growing instability in Afghanistan, Haiti, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Cuba, as well as political repression in Myanmar and Hong Kong suggest that the trend will continue. This is at a time when commitment from the international community to supporting the terms of the convention is eroding. The Global Compact on Refugees (GCR), adopted in December 2018, offers some innovative ideas that might help improve the picture, especially through responsibility sharing with countries hosting large numbers of refugees — but there is a need for a concerted multilateral effort to give those ideas impact. The United States under the Biden administration ought to lead this effort.
go to Brookings: The 1951 Refugee Convention is falling short of its mission. Could the Global Compact on Refugees help? (brookings.edu)