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UN: Increasing Refugee Population Faces Strained Aid Community

Heather Murdock

   GENEVA, BEKAA VALLEY AND BEIRUT, LEBANON - In his early 20s, Mohammad
   was a law student who raised bees on his uncle's farm in Syria.

   But in 2013, he faced a terrible choice: Join the military, join a
   rival militant group, face prison or flee his country.

   "What if I had to kill my own people?" he said at a mobile phone shop
   in an urban refugee camp in Beirut. "I tried to flee to Europe many
   times. I was caught by the Egyptian secret police, and they sent me to
   Damascus."

   There are now 70 million people "forcibly displaced" in the world, and
   their numbers are growing rapidly, according to the United Nations.
   Humanitarian aid is increasingly scarce, and the increase in refugees
   "is outpacing the rate at which solutions are being found," according
   to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.

   As more people flee their homes, it is becoming increasingly difficult
   to determine who is entitled to protection under international law, and
   who is not.

   "We need to uphold the refugee definition that is enshrined in the
   international legal system because it is strong, and we can leverage it
   in our discussions with States," U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees
   Filippo Grandi said at a Geneva conference on Tuesday. "We are not
   always successful, but we can use it. But we have to recognize also
   that many other people on the move have vulnerabilities and therefore
   need help."

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