1,382 Refugees live in Georgia while world number is over 70 mln
By Tea Mariamidze
Thursday, June 20
There are 1,382 refugees and humanitarian status persons in Georgia, most of who are citizens of Russia, Iraq, Ukraine, and Syria. However, the UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, reports the world number exceeds 70 million.
Nino Lomjaria, Public Defender of Georgia, held a discussion regarding the International Day of Refugees, marked on June 20, saying following the recent world developments, the number of asylum-seekers has increased in Georgia over the last few years.
The Ombudsman noted that the number of refugees 1,382 is the data of 2018, and it will likely be higher as the country gets more applications from asylum-seekers.
According to her, the study of the rights of asylum seekers, persons with international security and migrants is one of the priority directions for the Public Defender’s Office.
“Starting from 2015, with the support of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in the South Caucasus, the Public Defender’s representatives have been studying general human rights situation of asylum seekers and refugees in Georgia, and also carry out an intensive monitoring of the border access and the assessment procedure for determining refugee status by the Asylum-seekers’ Center,” said Lomjaria.
Granting of asylum is based on the UN 1951 Convention relating to the Status of refugees. according to this Convention, the term refugee applies to the person who “owing to well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country.”
The Law of Georgia regulates the issues related to obtaining asylum in Georgia on International Protection. The Law provides for the following forms of international protection:
• Refugee status;
• Humanitarian status;
• Status of a person under temporary protection.
The decision to grant any of the statuses mentioned above is made by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia.
World Refugee Day, observed on June 20 each year, is dedicated to raising awareness of the situation of refugees throughout the world.
Data from UNHCR’s annual Global Trends report, released on June 19, show that almost 70.8 million people are now forcibly displaced. This is double the level of 20 years ago and 2.3 million more than a year ago.
Within the 70.8-million figure in the Global Trends report are three main groups. The first is refugees, meaning people forced to flee their country because of conflict, war, or persecution. In 2018, the number of refugees reached 25.9 million worldwide, 500,000 more than in 2017.
UNHCR says the second group is asylum seekers – people outside their country of origin and receiving international protection, but awaiting the outcome of their claim to refugee status. At the end of 2018, there were 3.5 million asylum seekers globally.
The third and biggest group, at 41.3 million, is people displaced to other areas within their own country, a category commonly referred to as Internally Displaced People.
To note, in 2018, every second refugee was a child.
