In 2022, the number of people displaced from their homes grew by the largest amount on record, driven in part by Russia’s war in Ukraine. People flee their homes for a variety of reasons—persecution, poverty, conflict, climate change—and the crisis has shown no signs of slowing down. What policies can make the world safer for refugees and displaced people? What draws them to eventually return? And how much do aid organizations depend on top donors to accomplish their goals?
Filippo Grandi, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, joined FP’s Ravi Agrawal to explore the trends and traumas of the global refugee crisis.
Video clips from this event
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After U.S. President Joe Biden issued an executive order temporarily closing the southern border, chief of the U.N.’s refugee agency, Filippo Grandi, worries that some aspects are “at variance with international law.”
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The global refugee population, at 43 million, is three times higher than it was a decade ago. UNHCR’s Grandi says it’s because of a broken international system, adding, “This is a world that has become unable to make peace.”
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With most global attention focused on humanitarian needs in Ukraine and Gaza, Grandi decries the neglect of the crisis in Sudan: “People in Sudan go through the same suffering, suffer from the same abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law as the people in Ukraine or in Gaza, and yet nobody speaks about them.”
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In 2023, the United States contributed more funds to the UNHCR than the next 10 countries combined. Grandi reflects on the influence that gives it over agency priorities.
