More than a million Venezuelan arrivals to Colombia this year. Colombia’s migration authority said on Thursday that more than a million Venezuelans had crossed into the country since the start of this year, although 676,000 had subsequently moved on to other countries. Many of those transiting through Colombia head south to Ecuador, Peru and Chile. In a briefing in Geneva on Friday, UNHCR said it reinforced its response at border crossing points in Peru, Ecuador and Colombia this week as thousands of Venezuelans rushed into Peru ahead of a Wednesday deadline to apply for temporary stay permits. More than 6,700 people entered Peru from Ecuador at the main Tumbes border crossing on Wednesday, and Peruvian authorities have been working 24 hours a day to deal with an upsurge in asylum applications. Crossings of Venezuelans into Ecuador from Colombia have also increased, with 97,500 arrivals registered during October. UNHCR said “essential services and infrastructure in the receiving communities are being impacted by the volume of arrivals and it is becoming increasingly difficult to respond to all the needs”. The agency reiterated its call for more support from the international community. | | |
| Yemeni girl who turned world’s eyes to famine dies. The New York Times reports that Amal Hussain , the emaciated seven-year-old girl whose portrait accompanied a Times article about Yemen’s hunger crisis last week, died on Thursday in a camp for displaced people. Amal was one of 1.8 million children in Yemen was are severely malnourished, largely as a result of the ongoing conflict. On Thursday, the UN sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA, said the famine looming over Yemen may be the worst in the world’s recent history, putting up to two million pregnant and lactating women at risk of death. Nearly half of the country’s health facilities are no longer functioning, including those that were providing reproductive health services. | | |
| Caravan of Central Americans facing illness and exhaustion. Since setting off from San Pedro Sula in Honduras two weeks ago, the caravan of refugees and migrants now trekking across southern Mexico has covered more than 1,000 kilometres in sweltering heat and torrential downpours. Members of the group – which has shrunk to around 4,000 as some chose to seek asylum in Mexico or return home – are suffering from coughs and colds, blisters and sunburns, insect bites and eye infections, reports the Guardian. The journey, much of it on foot, is particularly hard for some 2,300 children who were among the group as of last week, according to UNICEF. | | |
| Spike in violence forces thousands of Somalis to flee homes. More than 21,000 people fled their homes during October, according to UNHCR, as several regions of the Somalia saw an increase in fighting. The Norwegian Refugee Council reports that many of the displaced are now in makeshift camps , surviving in flimsy shelters with little protection from the rains. Victor Moses, the NRC’s country director, said some of the hardest-hit areas were out of the reach of aid agencies due to insecurity. “These families were recovering from last year's drought, and fighting has now pushed them back into crisis,” he said. | | |
| Young refugees speak out about life on the Greek islands. About 37 per cent of the more than 26,000 refugees and migrants who have arrived by sea to the Greek islands so far this year are children. They and their families are living in overcrowded, unsanitary and dangerous accommodation centres where conditions are increasingly unbearable. Some of the children and young people living at the Moria reception centre on the island of Lesvos talked to UNICEF staff about their experiences. | | |
| Attack on villages and IDP camp in northeast Nigeria leaves 15 dead. Four villages and a camp for displaced people in Nigeria’s Borno State were attacked by suspected Boko Haram militants late Wednesday, leaving at least 15 people dead. A local council official told CNN that most of those killed were burned to death in their homes. Gunmen also opened fire on residents of one village as they ran to a nearby camp for displaced people. The militants then reportedly ransacked the market in front of the camp and set fire to parts of the camp, where 12,600 people have sought refuge from violence in the area in recent months. The UN’s humanitarian coordinator in Nigeria, Edward Kallon, condemned the attacks and urged the Nigerian government to “step up the protection of innocent people”. | | |
| A group of young refugees have gone from kicking a football around the park in the British city of Coventry to competing in the final of a West Midlands tournament for teams drawn from nations around the world. The Coventry team competed under the name Team Syria although they come from 10 different countries. | | |
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