I have been writing a lot about this over the years. This figure likely will rise to 100 to 150 million people displaced by 2025 to 2050. Causes are overpopulation, lack of potable water and tillable land, pollution of land and destruction of homes and farms by warfare. It would be hard to estimate the unbelievable numbers of displaced people by 2100. Because of present variables these numbers can only increase exponentially the rest of this century.
Unpredictable weather events make any other scenario not feasible. For example, photosynthesis does not work right above 90 degrees Fahrenheit for growing food.
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Conflict Pushes Displaced People to Record 65.3 Million
| Wall Street Journal | - |
A
record 65.3 million people were displaced by persecution and conflict
in 2015, and many encountered closed borders and stronger anti-asylum
sentiment, the United Nations said Monday.
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Conflict Pushes Displaced People to Record 65.3 Million
Last year, more people than ever before were displaced by persecution and conflict
ENLARGE
Refugees waiting to be
rescued in the Mediterranean in May. Over 2,000 people are feared dead
after several boats capsized off the Libyan coast this year.
Photo:
Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
It was the highest annual figure since the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees started keeping records, marking the first time the 60-million barrier was breached.
The number includes asylum seekers, refugees entitled to international protection and internally displaced people forced to leave their homes to avoid persecution.
The total—larger than the population of the U.K.—climbed from the 59.5 million registered at the end of 2014.
This means that one of every 113 people on the planet is now a refugee, an asylum seeker, or internally displaced in a home country.
“The willingness of nations to work together not just for refugees but for the collective human interest is what’s being tested today, and it is this spirit of unity that badly needs to prevail,” U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said.
Decades of fighting in Afghanistan and Somalia and new or reignited conflicts in places such as Syria, South Sudan and Yemen lifted the total number of refugees to 21.3 million—more than half of them children, the UNHCR said.
“Politics is gravitating against asylum in some countries,” said Mr. Grandi, adding that a “frightening” number of refugees and migrants are dying at sea, while on land people are finding their way blocked by closed borders.
While the European Union has managed to stem the influx of Syrian refugees and other migrants after striking a deal with Turkey in March, an increasing number of mostly African migrants are attempting to make the perilous journey via Libya across the Mediterranean Sea to Italy, indicating the difficulty in trying to stop people escaping conflict from attempting to reach the EU.
Some 50,000 people were rescued and brought to Italy this year and over 2,000 are feared dead after several boats capsized off the Libyan coast, according to the UNHCR.
Anxiety over rising immigration levels in the U.K. has fueled anti-EU sentiment before this week’s referendum on whether the country should leave the bloc.
U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has made a hard line on illegal immigration a centerpiece of his campaign.
Monday marks World Refugee Day, which was first commemorated in 2001.
A record 2 million new asylum requests were registered last year in industrialized countries. Germany received the highest number of asylum claims, at 441,900, followed by the U.S. with 172,700, mainly from individuals fleeing gang-related violence in Central America.
Despite the EU managing 1 million refugees and migrants who arrived in 2015 via the Mediterranean, UNHCR reports that 86% of refugees were located in the developing world. Among host countries Turkey has the most, with 2.5 million refugees.
Lebanon held more refugees relative to its population than any other country, or 183 for every 1,000 Lebanese.
Write to Liam Moloney at liam.moloney@wsj.com
