First Global Refugee Forum closes in Geneva with wide-ranging commitments of support

Source: Xinhua| 2019-12-19 05:07:30|Editor: yan

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GENEVA, Dec. 18 (Xinhua) -- The first Global Refugee Forum on Wednesday closed here with wide-ranging commitments of support for refugees and the communities they live in.

The UN refugee agency UNHCR said in a press release Wednesday that over 770 pledges had been made from across the spectrum as of mid-Wednesday afternoon at the Forum, attended by some 3,000 representatives of governments, international financial organizations, business leaders, humanitarian and development actors, refugees and civil societies.

These pledges were in areas including employment, places in schools for refugee children, new government policies, resettlements, clean energy, infrastructure and better support for host communities and countries.

The private sector made the widest range of commitments ever for the forcibly displaced, the UNHCR said, adding that in addition to humanitarian and development pledges, more than 250 million U.S. dollars was pledged by business groups.

Earlier at the forum, over 4.7 billion U.S. dollars was pledged by the World Bank Group, and there was a similar announcement from the Inter-American Development Bank of 1 billion U.S. dollars.

In addition, a broad range of states and other stakeholders pledged financial support for refugees and their host communities of over 2 billion U.S. dollars.

"Refugee situations are 'crises' only when we let them become so, by thinking short term, by failing to plan or work together across sectors, and by neglecting the communities they arrive in. At this Forum, we have seen a decisive shift towards the longer-term view," said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi.

The three-day Global Refugee Forum, first-ever of its kind to transform the way the world responds to refugee situations, kicked off here on Monday.

Hosted by the UN refugee agency UNHCR and Switzerland and co-convened by Costa Rica, Ethiopia, Germany, Pakistan and Turkey, the Forum is aiming to generate new approaches and long-term commitments from a variety of actors to help refugees and the communities in which they live.