Communities in crisis need knowledge and empowerment. FilmAid provides both, to millions of people suffering the effects of war, poverty, displacement or disaster. Films provide a way to reach many people at once, overcoming literacy boundaries, bringing forth information where it is needed and inspiring hope where it is lacking.
FilmAid International will now be active on Tumblr and weâre excited!Â
FilmAidâs mission is to use the power of film and media to transcend language and literacy, bring life-saving information, psychological relief and much-needed hope to refugees and other communities in need around the globe.Â
FilmAid is a non-profit humanitarian organization that was founded in 1999 by producer, Caroline Baron, who found that although refugees were in need of food and water, a huge issue they had was boredom. Thus, FilmAid was created. FilmAid, fifteen years later is dedicated to using film to educate and entertain displaced people around the world.Â
To learn more about FilmAid go to www.filmaid.org and to watch some of the original created FilmAid films visit our Youtube Page.Â
Donât hesitate to follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook and stay tuned for our weekly #Meetthefilmmaker series.Â
FilmAid presents DADAAB STORIES, an interactive, multi-media documentary project charting everyday life in the world's largest refugee camp, check out the preview. Stay tuned to Dadaab Stories at dadaabstories.org
/Film helps raise 10,000 for FilmAid's Work in the Dadaab Refugee Camp
Listeners and readers of the /Film podcast have contributed more than $10,000 in support of FilmAid International, an organization that uses film and media to provide life-saving information, education and psychological relief in refugee camps and communities in need around the globe.Â
"Film has changed my life," says Peter Sciretta, owner and editor of slashfilm.com. "I'm glad we were able to help FilmAid in using the projected image to help change the lives of others less fortunate.â Slashfilm has received support from the film community in raising awareness for the campaign, with tweets from Colin Hanks, Damon Lindelof, Seth Rogen, Jon Chu, @Imax and more.
Funds raised for FilmAid will go to its programs in Dadaab, the largest refugee camp in the world, temporary home to more than 400,000 people fleeing drought and armed conflict in Somalia. Working in partnership with the UN Refugee Agency and global NGOs, FilmAid screens films addressing critical health and safety issues. It also trains refugee filmmakers to tell their stories and address community issues in their own voices.
âSlashfilmâs support comes at a critical time and provides a significant, and much appreciated, boost to FilmAid's programs in Dadaab," says FilmAid Executive Director Liz Manne.
For more information about FilmAid International â www.filmaid.org
For more information about /Film â www.slashfilm.com
Thanks to the shared belief in the power of film to change lives, /Films has partnered with FilmAid International in efforts to raise $10,000 for the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya, the largest refugee camp in the world.
For every $1,000 donated /Film will broadcast a 1hour long /Filmcast on March 30th that will include guests from the show and possibly interesting surprises.
All donations will go to FilmAid Internationalâs ongoing efforts in the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya, which currently holds over 400,000 refugees. The increase in incoming refugees makes FilmAid critically important for providing life saving information on health and safety, as well as providing a gleam of hope in difficult times.
Global Finalists for 2013 Intercultural Innovation Award
Today the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) and the BMW Group announced FilmAid as one of only 10 global finalists for the 2013 Intercultural Innovation Award.
FilmAid has been selected as a finalist for its work in the field of film and media, bringing life-saving information, psychological relief and much-needed hope to refugees and other communities in need in Northern Kenya and around the globe. Representatives from FilmAid Kenya will present FilmAidâs work at the Viennese Volkstheatre on Tuesday, February 26th, 2013.
President Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser, United Nations High Representative for the Alliance of Civilizations and Mr. Bill McAndrews, Vice President, Corporate Communications Strategy, Corporate and Market Communications, BMW Group will chair the ceremony, in the presence of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. High-level representatives of the UNAOC and the BMW Group will give the award to the five top organizations.
Since 2011, the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) and the BMW Group have engaged in a historic partnership geared towards creating a new model for collaboration between the private sector and the UN system. To that end, the two organizations have established The Intercultural Innovation Award whose mandate is to select highly innovative grassroots projects that promote dialogue and intercultural understanding and make vital contributions to prosperity and peace in global societies.
FilmAid is honored and thankful to the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations and BMW Group for this fantastic opportunity!
Alfre Woodard, Global Artist Council Member, and Caroline Baron, FilmAid Founder, take questions at the Cinema for Peace Gala, held on January 11, 2013 in Los Angeles. Woodard and Baron, joined by FilmAid Board Member Sharon Swart, attended the Gala where FilmAid was honored for its work with film in refugee camps. The Cinema for Peace Gala, a featured event leading up to the Golden Globes, honors work of film-related organizations and their celebrity partners.
Actors Rufus Sewell, Sarita Choudhury and Sienna Guillory â alongside refugees from Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya â are featured in FilmAidâs new PSA, âWhy Film?â
Produced with the support of Ridley Scott Associates and independent filmmaker K. Ryan Jones, the two minute ïŹlm asks the fundamental question âwhy ïŹlm?â and provides compelling examples of the role ïŹlm, and the work of FilmAid, plays in humanitarian crises.
Shot in New York, London and Kenya, âWhy Film?â brings together members of the ïŹlm community from a variety of backgrounds, lending their voices to help raise vital funds for FilmAid International. Filming in London, Sienna Guillory said, âThe work that FilmAid does is vital. The conditions they operate in, and the lengths they go to bring mobile cinemas into refugee camps, are extraordinary. Teaching essential ïŹlm-making skills to refugees to ensure that life-saving information is shared through the camps, whilst also using ïŹlm to give people something other than loss they can bond over, and a means to escape their emotional situation is so important. I hope that âWhy Film?â helps people understand why ïŹlm aid is a necessity and not a luxury.âÂ
Founded in 1999 by award-winning producer Caroline Baron (Capote, Monsoon Wedding), FilmAid is a non-profit, charitable organization with a mission to use the power of ïŹlm and media to bring life-saving information, psychological relief and much-needed hope to refugees and other communities in need around the globe.
âWhy Film?â is available to view now at www.ïŹlmaid.org/whyïŹlm where you can also make a donation in support of FilmAidâs global programs.
âThe Music Producerâ is the story of Omwot Omwot Ogul, full-time music producer, part-time handyman, who lives in Dadaab, the worldâs largest refugee settlement.
After fleeing his homeland, the Gambela region in Ethiopia, in 2004, Omwot found himself in Kenyaâs Kakuma refugee camp. He subsequently moved to capital Nairobi, where he discovered his love of music. Five years later, Omwot was forced to uproot once again. This time, he relocated to the Dadaab camp, home to nearly 500,000 refugees.
Now an independent music producer, an unlikely profession in this isolated corner of sub-Saharan Africa, Omwot empowers his fellow refugees to make music about their lives and helps them record that music. On the side, he works as a handyman, repairing and charging phones for people in the camp, using a personal solar panel he built and installed.
âThe Music Producerâ was shot by Ramah Hawkins, a Nairobi-based filmmaker who spent several months in the settlement collaborating with FilmAidâs Kenyan and refugee staff and film students there. The short film is part of Dadaab Stories, a web-native, multi-media documentary project charting everyday life in the Dadaab refugee camp, located in eastern Kenya, on the border of Somalia. Using videos, poetry and music, Dadaab Stories provides a platform for refugees to tell their own stories to the world in their own voices.
Supported by the Tribeca Film Institute New Media Fund and the Ford Foundation, this project aims to increase public understanding of refugee lives, forge a deeper connection between the refugee community and the outside world, offer a platform for creative expression and document the history of the refugee experience.
Personal stories are the central part of the project â a record of the extraordinary experiences of the refugees in Dadaab, and a powerful advocacy platform for ongoing international attention to the region. But the project does not only focus exclusively on the darker aspects of life in the camps. Dadaab is a living place and the people in it live their lives and dreams just like anywhere else.
We hope you enjoy this special preview from FilmAidâs Dadaab Stories. If it inspires you with a spirit of generosity this holiday season, we thank you for supporting our work, projecting hope and making change for refugees and other displaced communities: www.filmaid.org/donate.
FilmAidâs Annual Power of Film Benefit took place at the stunning Desmond Tutu Center in New York City.Â
FilmAid honored Jean Oelwang, CEO of Virgin Unite; Gary Knell, President and CEO of National Public Radio; and Madeline Anbinder, retiring FilmAid Board Member. Ms. Oelwang was this yearâs recipient of FilmAidâs Richard C. Holbrooke Memorial Award for Dedication to Humanitarian Service. Mr. Knell received the FilmAid Community Leadership award for his careerâs work, at NPR and before that Sesame Workshop. Ms. Anbinder, a tireless and generous supporter of FilmAidâs mission since its inception, received the Philanthropic Leadership Award.Â
Stars of the evening included Sarita Choudhury (âHomelandâ) as Master of Ceremonies and Fintage Houseâs neighboring rights and worldwide music publishing client, Raul MidĂłn, who closed the evening with his hit song âEverybody.â Guests enjoyed a Live Auction with stand-up comedian Negin Farsad, featuring items including passes to the Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride, Colorado, four nights at the Viceroy Resort in Anguilla, and tickets to see The Rolling Stones perform on their â50 and Countingâ tour.
This is the voice of 29yr old, Amos Lolibo from Lodwar, Turkana, a student of FilmAidâs filmmaker training program in Kakuma refugee camp. This year, Amosâ film, Never Again, was selected for the 7th edition of the Kenya International Film Festival and was screened alongside other FilmAid student films as part of the week's events.
Never Again, is a powerful documentary reflecting on those affected by the 2007/08 post-election violence. Using chilling archival footage and firsthand interviews from Kakuma refugee camp, Never Again leaves a lasting impression of Kenya's past election, where over 1,300 people lost their lives and an estimated 650,000 were displaced.
âThis is a real story,â says Amos, âthat needed to be made into a film so people could watch it.â However, you donât just watch this film. You are drawn into it, experience it and feel it too.
Screened for the first time at this yearâs World Refugee Day and FilmAid Film Festival in Kakuma, Never Again stirred emotions among audience members, some even requesting repeat screenings in their villages.
When asked about the making of the film, Amos speaks about crew tension and lighting challenges. Normal production life of course, but add in incessant heat and dusty wind, and you can start to get a sense of what a huge accomplishment this film was for the crew.
In 2010, Amos met FilmAid and applied one year later for the student filmmaker training program which also runs in Dadaab. The program works both with refugees and youth from the host community. Amos is one of many students who are trained in creative and technical film skills such as scriptwriting, camera operations and post production. The training program empowers young people to tell their own stories in their own voice.
At the end of each program, these powerful student films, focusing on issues such as health, security, identity and peace, are screened back to the refugee community and posted to FilmAidâs YouTube channel for global dissemination. Some of these films are even selected for festivals. This year, Never Again was screened at the Slum Film Festival in Nairobi, winning second prize in documentary shorts.
Although Never Again was a big achievement for Amos, he is already assisting as the boom swinger, fixer and translator in a new FilmAid production about peace. The production focuses on the peaceful coexistence between the Kakuma refugees and the host community.
âFilm is what I feel, it is my force to fight poverty in my communityâ, he says.
One year on from launching the global FilmAid / Chivas partnership in Cannes 2011, which was supported by FilmAid Global Artists Council member Robert De Niro, Chivas have released a new short film, which brings to life some of the work that has been made possible through the partnership to date.
This blog entry has been reposted from Mountain Film
Stash Wislocki, the producer of Mountainfilm in Telluride, is in Kenya right now with FilmAid. This is his second installment from his experience. (Read his first report from Kakuma Refugee Camp.)
We left Kakuma Refugee Camp this morning after an intense two weeks of helping the FilmAid students and staff produce the 2012 FilmAid Kakuma Film Festival. By all accounts, it was a success.
At night, we moved about, screening films in the different camps. The students worked hard, and it paid off with fantastic shows and great attendance. Everyone loved the student films. These screenings left me impressed by the powerful impact of FilmAid's work.
As I leave Kakuma, I realize that the refugees, especially the students, have taught me far more than I taught them. The takeaway lesson from this trip is that if these people can be optimistic in this place, then I have no reason to ever be pessimistic. Conditions here are always dusty and insanely hot, and the refugees live on scant food rations. Everyone at Kakuma is here because of extreme circumstances: Iâve met children whose parents were killed in war, kids who were soldiers and people fleeing famine. Despite being pushed to the brink, the FilmAidand students are cheerful and sweet. Most of them cling to the hope that someday they will get relocated to America.
Yes, the American dream hasnât lost its lure, and itâs actually refreshing to feel proud to be an American. Our taxpayer dollars are hard at work here. Funds from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Health and Human Services are being well used. Workers from the U.N. and the States say that the U.S. takes more refugees from here than any other country (and could take even more if they could cut through the U.N. red tape).
With a heavy heart, I said goodbye to all of my new friends at Kakuma and am now in in Nairobi, working at the FilmAid office and, hopefully, headed soon to the Kibera slum.
New Wave of âLost Boysâ Flee Sudanâs Lingering War
This entry is reposted from the New York Times.
Photo:Tyler Hicks/The New York Times
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN/NY Times
30 June 2012: YIDA, South Sudan â Thousands of unaccompanied children are streaming out of an isolated, rebellious region of Sudan, fleeing a relentless aerial assault and the prospect of famine.
Sent by their parents on harrowing odysseys across battlefields and malaria-infested swamps, the children are repeating one of the most sordid chapters of Sudanese history: the perilous flight of the so-called Lost Boys during the civil war in the 1990s, who wandered hundreds of miles dodging militias, bombers and lions.
Now, a new generation of Lost Boys, and some Lost Girls, too, is emerging from a war that, despite a peace agreement, has never completely ended.
Haidar Musa, 14, recently trudged into the muddy, mushrooming refugee camp here in Yida, which is growing by 1,000 people a day, turning a lush green jungle into a squalid sea of white United Nations tarps. With him were eight other boys with shredded clothes and bellies full of grass, their only sustenance for several days.
They stood barefoot in the dirt, eagerly watching an enormous vat of beans come to a boil, ready for a real meal and a new home: a crushed cardboard box to sleep on, in a rat-infested hut.
John Prendergast, co-founder of the Enough Project, which fights to end genocide and crimes against humanity, worked closely with the Lost Boys 20 years ago. âThose survivors seemed to have a one-time story, never to be repeated,â he said. âBut here we are again.â
Sudan, perhaps more than any other country in this region, seems to have a destructive capacity to sink back to the worst days of its past.
So many other African nations have plunged into civil war but eventually pulled themselves out. Even bullet-riddled Somalia is finally shaking off chaos. But the Sudanese have essentially been at war with themselves for 56 years, with few respites. Today, this war grinds on in many of the same old places, in many of the same old ways.
A hallmark of the Sudanese governmentâs counterinsurgency strategy is an unsparing assault on civilians, unleashed in the south in the 1980s, the Nuba Mountains in the 1990s and Darfur in the early 2000s.
Now, it is the Nuba Mountains again, where bombing by the Sudanese air force has forced entire villages to retreat to mountaintop caves, leaving fields unplowed, markets empty and people on the brink of starvation.
The bloodshed in Nuba is directed by some of the same officials responsible for previous massacres, like President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, in power since 1989, and Ahmed Haroun, governor of the state that encompasses the Nuba Mountains. Both are wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of crimes against humanity for the bloodshed in Darfur, and Mr. Bashir has also been charged with genocide.
The current offensive seems to be putting Nuban children square in the cross hairs, and often there is nowhere to run.
A caretaker in the Yida camp said 14 boys trying to get here were gunned down at a Sudanese Army checkpoint. Bomb shrapnel has sliced apart countless others. Disease is sweeping the countryside, and many infants who make it to Yida on their mothersâ backs are so skinny and sick that they are immediately treated in a field hospital with feeding tubes up their noses.
Since even before independence in 1956, Sudan has been dogged by center-periphery tensions often expressed in exploding shells. Just as the central government has a tradition of brutality, minority groups in the hinterland have a tradition of heavily armed insurrection.
Today, tens of thousands of Nuban soldiers, equipped with artillery, rockets and tanks, are refusing to disarm until the government falls in Khartoum, Sudanâs capital, saying that they have been marginalized and oppressed, partly because many Nubans are non-Arab and Christian, while the Khartoum government is dominated by Arab Muslims.
The newly independent nation of South Sudan, which split off from Sudan last year, is suspected of funneling weapons to the Nuban rebels, who operate just north of the border and fought alongside the southern Sudanese for years. Sudan and South Sudan have nearly gone to war in recent months, after hitting an impasse over how to share oil profits and demarcate the border.
The economies of both countries are reeling, with riots breaking out across Sudan this past week, testing Mr. Bashirâs grip on power and encouraging the Nuban rebels to fight on. No one sees this war letting up anytime soon.
In Yida, about 20 miles south of the border with Sudan, daybreak is heralded by the crack of axes splitting wood. Trees are being chopped down. Roads are being cleared. The camp is becoming permanent.
United Nations officials are desperate to stop this, saying the camp is too close to a military zone, the disputed border. Yida itself has been bombed. Camp officials are refusing to build schools or hand out seeds, telling the approximately 60,000 refugees to move south. But the refugees are not budging, saying the soil is bad farther south.
âOur position is not ambiguous,â said Teresa Ongaro of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. âWe have serious safety concerns about the refugees staying in Yida.â
The camp seems to be doubling as a rebel base. Recently, not far from where Haidar and the other boys live, Nuban rebels carrying machine guns loaded up a truck with barrels of fuel and then covered their cargo with a white United Nations tarp.
The Nubans are a paradox. They are celebrated for their old-school ways, like scarification and heroic wrestling, yet at the same time yearn for a modern education. Many children said their parents sent them away because most schools had closed in the Nuba Mountains when the bombing started. The hope was that they could learn in Yida.
Other children said they were separated from their families during the innumerable ground attacks and shelling sprees of the past year.
Often the packs of children, some as young as 7, were led by a teacher or rebel fighter through the stony Nuba hills to Yida, a hellish journey that usually takes about 10 days on foot.
Haidarâs hut, number 60 in the childrenâs camp, is shared with three other boys. None have a mosquito net, though malaria is rampant and often deadly.
One of his hutmates, Jazooli, has no idea where his parents are.
Another, Mohamed, said his mother and father abandoned him.
Haidar was a slave, having been kidnapped by Arab horsemen when he was 6, along with his brother, and pressed into bondage herding goats. Slavery was an acute problem during the north-south civil war and seems to be on the rise again. The kidnappers recently shot Haidarâs brother, he said. Haidar fled, finding other boys along the way and essentially giving up on his parents.
âI donât remember what my parents look like,â he whispered.
The volunteer camp leaders are exasperated. They are trying to keep the camp clean, ordering the kids to sweep the ground with twigs and scour the pots with sand.
âBut unless the war ends, itâs going to be very hard,â said Ahmed Mamoun, a caretaker. âI donât see how these children will find their parents.â
How A Joy Formidable Song Found Its Way to a Kenyan Refugee Camp
This entry is reposted from MTV IGGY
By Beverly Bryan
20 June 2012-There is a proverb from Ghana that says âthe drummer does not know how far the sound travels.â The Joy Formidable found out recently that this piece of wisdom holds as true for Welsh rockers in the UK as it does for West Africans.
The trio has become known worldwide for big swelling anthems that mix extremely loud shoegaze with the emotional punch of melodic post-hardcore. As of late, theyâve finished a second album, mostly recorded and written in Portland, Maine and finished on the tour bus while making their way through the US in March, followed by a big date at Bonnaroo. It was a bit rushed but they did get to see the Beach Boys. Theyâre busy building on the success of 2011âČs debut album The Big Roar. Theyâve reached a lot of people with their music, but about a month ago they found out just how far their sound had traveled.
Two filmmakers who had been volunteering as teaching artists in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Northern Kenya contacted them to say that they had used the Joy Formidable single âA Heavy Abacusâ in a short film they shot with kids in the camp, most of whom are fleeing violence in Sudan. It shows some of the campâs youngest residents smiling and mouthing the lyrics of the song, creating a very compelling impression that they are singing Bryanâs emotive vocals.
The filmmakers, Paola Mendoza and Topaz Adizes, wanted to know if it was alright with the band. It was. More than alright with it, The Joy Formidable has been enthusiastically spreading the word about FilmAid, the organization Mendoza and Adizes work with. âWeâre very keen for people to see it,â singer and guitarist Ritzy Bryan says, âWeâre just very, very honored to be involved in the project.â She got to see the rough cut a couple of weeks ago.
Bryan admits she hadnât heard of FilmAid before Mendoza and Adizes got in touch, but is now one of its champions. âThere are a whole lot of problems to tackle in the area where theyâre working, but I think the way theyâre approaching it, through the power of images and art as a way of connecting with people is great,â Bryan says. âItâs a great charity. We hope the video helps them reach a wider audience. It challenges people to think for a second about how other people are living. Ultimately the idea of the video is to encourage people to donate to what is a great charity.â
FilmAid uses video in different ways to uplift refugees and other vulnerable communities all over the world. Workers teach filmmaking, help refugees tell their stories, and bring movies to inform and entertain camps using mobile movie screens attached to trucks. FilmAid released the video to raise awareness, not only about their work but about World Refugee Day. Observed annually on June 20, the date was created by the UN to remember those who have been forced by conflict or disaster to leave their homes, people like the kids in Kakuma.
The band members themselves wanted to find out more about Kakuma after they saw the video. âWe were curious. It definitely affected us. The images are very moving. I think we all need to be shaken out of our complacency, to take a moment to think about other peopleâs situations,â the musician said.
Bryan explains âA Heavy Abacusâ is in some ways in harmony with the video. Even if they didnât have a refugee camp in mind when it was written, it is a song about children. âWhen we originally wrote it a year and a half ago it was very much inspired by themes of children growing up too fast, losing innocence, not being shielded from adult problems, materialism. That was what was driving the song originally, and a lot of that was just based on the current state of what children are exposed to. And wanting children to be children for as long as possible.â
âObviously, the video has put it in a completely different context. It brings a whole new level of poignancy. These children, theyâre facing a much more serious challenge of basic survival,â the soft-spoken frontwoman reflected.
The Joy Formidable at Bonaroo. Credit: Getty Images
Being forced to leave your home in the wake of civil war can certainly bring a loss of innocence, but in the video, kids of all ages are just being kids â laughing and playing, albeit under difficult circumstances. Thatâs part of what makes the film so poignant. The stars of the video might show resilience, but the filmmakers depict something far more precarious, explaining in text that 2,000 new refugees arrive at the Kakuma each month.
The video was shot in just three days using one camera, two light reflectors and an iPhone, but itâs hard to imagine it being more impactful. The final shot shows the entire cast singing the chorus: âAbacus watching me.â Their faces, like the accompanying words and melody, are hard to forget. It puts a vibrant human face on a humanitarian crisis.
âItâs a beautifully shot video and it kind of underscores their mantra at FilmAid. The way that theyâre connecting with people in places like Kakuma is through the power of film. I think itâs a very obvious example of how that can transcend other forms of communication. Music, art and visuals combined can bring home a very powerful message,â Bryan says of the clip.
The award-winning filmmakers made a similar statement about their project: âWhile working in the Kakuma Refugee camp we were inspired by the strength of the people we met. So often refugees are forgotten because the problem seems too overwhelming. Our intention was to have two worlds crashing together with the hopes that in the mash-up both worldsâ beauty would shine through in their purest form.â
It seems to be having the desired effect. âCertainly, there have been a lot of people watching it who have been curious about the background, the charity and the work that FilmAid does. Itâs had a great response. Itâs been shared by a whole host of people from different walks of life it seems,â Bryan reports.
There is more information about World Refugee Day at Worldrefugeeday.us
New UN report shows record 800,000 people became refugees in 2011
Photo:UNHCR/B.BannonThis entry is reposted from the UN news center.
UNHCR set up the first camps in the Dadaab complex in 1991 to host up to 90,000 people. Today they host more than 463,000 refugees.
18 June 2012 â Ahead of World Refugee Day, the United Nations refugee agency reported today that a record 800,000 people were forced to flee across borders last year, more than at any time since 2000.
The new refugees are part of a total of 4.3 million people who were newly displaced last year, owing to a string of major humanitarian crises that began in late 2010 in CÎte d'Ivoire, and followed by others in Libya, Somalia, Sudan and elsewhere, according to Global Trends 2011, issued by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
â2011 saw suffering on an epic scale. For so many lives to have been thrown into turmoil over so short a space of time means enormous personal cost for all who were affected,â said the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, AntĂłnio Guterres, in a news release.
âWe can be grateful only that the international system for protecting such people held firm for the most part and that borders stayed open. These are testing times,â he added.
Some 42.5 million people ended 2011 either as refugees (15.2 million), internally displaced (26.4 million) or in the process of seeking asylum (895,000), according to the report, which is UNHCRâs main publication on the state of forced displacement.
At the same time, 2011 saw some 3.2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) return home â the highest rate of returns of IDPs in more than a decade.
Among the âworryingâ trends noted in the report, UNHCR said that forced displacement is affecting larger numbers of people globally, with the annual level exceeding 42 million people for each of the last five years.
Another is that a person who becomes a refugee is likely to remain as one for many years â often stuck in a camp or living precariously in an urban location. Of the 10.4 million refugees under UNHCRâs mandate, almost three quarters (7.1 million) have been in exile for at least five years while awaiting a solution.
Overall, Afghanistan remains the biggest producer of refugees (2.7 million), followed by Iraq (1.4 million), Somalia (1.1 million), Sudan (500,000) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (491,000).
Among industrialized countries, Germany ranks as the largest hosting country with 571,700 refugees. South Africa, meanwhile, was the largest recipient of individual asylum applications (107,000), a status it has held for the past four years.
While UNHCRâs original mandate was to help refugees, its work over the past six decades has grown to include helping many of the worldâs IDPs and those who are stateless â those lacking recognized citizenship and the human rights that accompany this.
The report notes that only 64 governments provided data on stateless people, meaning that UNHCR was able to capture numbers for only around a quarter of the estimated 12 million stateless people worldwide.
World Refugee Day falls on Wednesday, 20 June. According to UNHCR, the theme for this yearâs observance is âRefugees have no choice. You do.â and focuses on the tough choices facing refugees, helping the public to empathize with, and understand, their dilemma.Â
