Millions of refugees and internally displaced people risk losing access to essential protection and assistance as a severe funding shortfall forces the United Nations refugee agency to reduce its humanitarian operations worldwide. Source: Vatican News.
Speaking to Vatican News, Sophie Magennis, head of the policy and legal support unit at UNHCR’s Regional Representation for EU Affairs in Brussels, warned that the scale of the financial crisis is already threatening the agency’s ability to respond to the needs of people forced to flee their homes.
“Unfortunately, at UNHCR we have seen a reduction of 24 per cent in our finances last year, and that’s a very significant reduction,” she said.
The agency has secured about $US3 billion ($4.3 billion) for its programs this year, Ms Magennis said, but this represented just 35 per cent of the resources needed to meet the needs identified through its humanitarian operations.
The consequences of that shortfall extend beyond the agency’s own capacity to deliver assistance. They also affect the countries hosting displaced people, many of which have limited resources of their own.
“What’s important to keep in mind is that the vast majority of the world’s displaced people and refugees are hosted by the least well-off countries in the world,” Ms Magennis said.
The reduction in funding therefore places a double burden on countries already struggling to provide for their own populations while offering shelter and protection to people fleeing conflict and persecution.
“The impact is both on our finances to support refugees and displaced people where they are, but also to support host countries,” she said, stressing that financial assistance is essential to enable those countries to continue providing protection.
Ms Magennis was speaking in the wake of the publication of a 26-page UNHCR report that outlines the impact of budget cuts on refugee registration, child protection programs and services for survivors of gender-based violence.
The report, which seeks to draw attention to the potential consequences of the funding crisis, concludes that “below a certain threshold, the system doesn’t shrink, it fails.”
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UNHCR funding cuts put millions of displaced people at risk (By Alexandra Sirgant and Linda Bordoni, Vatican News)
