ROME: The first refugee to lead the UN refugee agency has said that the world faces \u201ca very difficult moment in history\u201d and is appealing to a common humanity amid dramatic change.<\/p>\n
Repression of immigrants is growing, and the funding to protect them is plummeting. <\/p>\n
Without ever mentioning the Trump administration or its policies directly, Barham Salih said his office will have to be inventive to confront the crisis, which includes losing well over $1 billion in US support.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course it\u2019s a fight, undeniably so, but I think also I\u2019m hopeful and confident that there is enough humanity out there to really enable us to do that,\u201d said Salih, a former president of Iraq.<\/p>\n
He was also adamant on the need to safeguard the 1951 refugee convention as the Trump administration campaigns for other governments to join it in upending a decades-old system and redefining asylum rules.<\/p>\n
Salih, who took up his role as high commissioner for refugees on Jan. 1, described it as an international legal responsibility and a moral responsibility.<\/p>\n
According to his agency also known as UNHCR, there are 117.3 million forcibly displaced people around the world from 194 countries. Salih\u2019s challenge is supporting some 30 million refugees with significantly less funds.<\/p>\n
In 2024 and 2025, funding from the US dropped from $2.1 billion to $800 million, and yet the country remains UNHCR\u2019s largest donor.<\/p>\n
\u201cResources made available to helping refugees are being constrained and limited in very, very significant way,\u201d Salih said.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration is also reviewing the US asylum system, suspending the refugee program in 2025 and setting a limit for entries to 7,500, mostly white South Africans \u2014 a historic low for refugee admittance since the program\u2019s inception in 1980.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration also has tightened immigration enforcement as part of its promise to increase deportations, while facing criticism for deportations to third countries and an uproar over two fatal shootings by federal officers and other deaths.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to accept the need for adapting with a new environment in the world,\u201d Salih said. <\/p>\n
His agency is seeking to be more cost-effective, \u201cto really deliver assistance to the people who need it, rather than be part of a system that sustains dependency on humanitarian assistance,\u201d he added. Salih has already met Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican. He said he was grateful for the support of the pontiff \u2014 the first pope from the US.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe voice of the church and faith-based organizations in this endeavor is absolutely vital,\u201d Salih said. \u201cHis moral support, his voice of the need for supporting refugees and what we do as UNHCR at this moment is very, very important.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ROME: The first refugee to lead the UN refugee agency has said that the world faces \u201ca very difficult moment in history\u201d and is appealing to a common humanity amid dramatic change. Repression of immigrants is growing, and the funding to protect them is plummeting. Without ever mentioning the Trump administration or its policies directly, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":92876,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92867"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92867\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92885,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92867\/revisions\/92885"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}