Conflicts and natural disasters forced millions of people to flee within their home countries last year, bringing the total number of internally displaced people to a record close to 60 million, according to a study released on Thursday by the NGO.
The internally displaced will number 59.1 million in 2021, nearly half of whom are under 18 years old, according toInternal Displacement Monitoring Center (IDMC) and the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).
Every year, this number – which therefore does not take into account refugees abroad – continues to grow, and a new record should be set in this regard in 2022 due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which started on February 24.
This is the second highest annual number in ten years, back in 2020, which saw a record number of displacements due to a series of natural disasters.
“The world has collapsed” – Jan Egeland
The year 2022 promises to be darkwith a particular war in Ukraine, alerted the director ofIDMCAlexandra Bilak, at a press conference.
More than 8 million people have fled within Ukraine, more than two months after Russia’s invasion of the country, according toUN.
The situation in the world has never been so badSecretary General’s observations NRCJan Egeland, making sure of that the world collapsed.
” The situation today is actually incredibly worse than our record number suggests. We need world leaders to make a major change in their thinking about conflict prevention and resolution to end rising human suffering. “
Internal displacement in Africa
Last year, sub-Saharan Africa was the region that recorded the highest number of internal displacements (many people moved several times), including more than 5 million in Ethiopia alone, a country under strict drought and where unrest broke out at the end of 2020 in the Tigray region. This is the highest number recorded in a country.
Unprecedented numbers were also recorded last year in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Afghanistan, where the Taliban’s return to power accompanied by drought has forced many people to flee their homes.
In Burma, where the military took power following a coup in February 2021, the number of displacements also reached a record high.
The Middle East and North Africa, on the other hand, recorded the lowest levels of new displacement in ten years, where conflicts in Syria, Libya and Iraq have seen some de-escalation, but the total number of people who have fled the region remain. high.
Thus, Syria still has the highest number of internally displaced people due to the conflict, i.e., 6.7 million by the end of 2021. Followed by the DRC (5.3 million) and Colombia (5.2 million), as well as Afghanistan and Yemen (4.3 million each).
Although the number of people displaced by the unrest is still increasing, natural disasters remain the main reason why people are forced to flee their homes (23.7 million displacements in 2021).
At least 94% of these displacements are attributed to meteorological and climatic disasters, such as hurricanes, floods and droughts, phenomena that are increasingly frequent and severe due to climate change.
70% of internal displacement associated with natural disasters in 2021 was recorded in China, the Philippines and India.
But increasingly, conflicts and natural disasters go hand in hand, Mr. Egeland said.
In places like Mozambique, Burma, Somalia and South Sudan, crises are overlapping, affecting food security and increasing the vulnerability of millions of people.
Source: Radio-Canada
