| Attacks in eastern DR Congo drive new displacement amid Ebola threat. UNHCR reports that violence by armed groups is on the rise in the Beni area of North Kivu Province and further north in Ituri Province, driving new displacement in an area that already has the highest number of internally displaced people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The worsening insecurity also threatens efforts to contain an Ebola outbreak in the region. Last weekend, fighting reached Beni city itself for the first time, killing more than 20 people and forcing some aid groups to put their activities on hold while the city marks a period of mourning. Meanwhile, a series of new attacks in Djugu Territory in Ituri has destabilized an area that was recovering from large-scale violence and displacement in the first half of this year. UNHCR reports that the numbers of people fleeing across Lake Albert to Uganda has remained fairly stable, with arrivals averaging about 200 people a day. The agency is working with the World Health Organization to screen refugees arriving in Uganda for symptoms of the Ebola virus. So far, no cases have been reported. | | |
| New UN panel to prepare indictments over Rohingya atrocities. The UN Human Rights Council yesterday voted in favour of a resolution to set up a panel to prepare evidence of human rights abuses committed in Myanmar for any future prosecution. Thirty-five of the council’s 47 members voted in favour of the resolution, which was brought by the EU and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation following a UN fact-finding report earlier this month. The new panel is to work closely with any future prosecution brought by the International Criminal Court. | | |
| Sharp rise in Iranians seeking asylum in Serbia. In an effort to boost tourism, last year Serbia became the first country in mainland Europe to offer visa-free travel to Iranians. The Guardian reports that increasing numbers of Iranians are flying into Belgrade but not taking their return flights home. While some are attempting to move on towards the EU via Bosnia and Herzegovina, more than 1,500 have expressed a desire to seek asylum in Serbia. In its September update from Serbia, UNHCR noted that among newly arrived asylum-seekers and migrants, Iranians were the third largest nationality, after Afghans and Pakistanis. | | |
| A way forward for the US asylum system. A new report from the Migration Policy Institute, co-authored by two former immigration officials, recommends a number of actions to address what they describe as a crisis in the US asylum system that has led to a major backlog of cases. The authors lay out a set of initial steps the administration could take to begin to repair the system without narrowing access to humanitarian protection. They include allowing asylum officers at the southern border to adjudicate cases rather than referring them to backlogged immigration courts and strengthening cooperation with neighbouring countries to better manage humanitarian flows through the region. | | |
| Greece’s Evros region unprepared for a new influx of asylum-seekers. IRIN reports from northern Greece, where a surge in the number of asylum-seekers crossing the Turkish border via the Evros River took authorities by surprise in March and April. Six months later, arrivals have slowed, but worries persist that the region’s refugee reception system is still poorly prepared for any new influx. New arrivals are brought to “pre-removal centres” run by the Hellenic police until they can be transferred to the area’s only official Reception and Identification Centre in Fylakio. NGO staff working at the centre told IRIN the facility remained under-staffed and lacked translators. UNHCR and others have called on the Greek government to improve conditions and expand reception capacity in the region. | | |
| Palestinian refugee agency gets $118 million in new funding. Germany, the European Union, Kuwait, Ireland and Norway all promised to contribute funding to UNRWA to help it fill a shortfall left by a cut in US funding. The pledges were made on Thursday at a meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York. UNRWA chief Pierre Krähenbühl said the new funds were “a significant step in the direction of overcoming UNRWA’s greatest and gravest financial crisis ever”, adding that the shortfall in the annual budget now stood at $68 million. Jordan's Foreign Minister, Ayman Safadi, who co-hosted the meeting, said discussions were under way on ensuring long-term financing for the agency. | | |
| South Sudanese refugee and women’s rights activist Mercy Akuot talks about why education for girls is so key to defeating forced and early marriage and other abuses against women and girls like those she herself experienced. At an event in New York yesterday attended by leaders and policy makers, refugees spoke about the pressing need to make education a priority in refugee responses. | | |
Today, over four million refugee children are out of school. This is an increase of half a million children from 2016.
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