Geneva – GENEVA (AP) — The head of the United Nations refugee agency suggested Monday that President Donald Trump should implement America Deportation practices This violates international law, and has criticized a wider “backlash” in some countries against migrants and refugees.
Filippo Grandi, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, used a speech to lament that severe funding cuts and shortfalls have forced his agency, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, to cut nearly 5,000 jobs this year, or nearly a quarter of its workforce. He said the cuts may not end.
“This has certainly not been an easy year for any of us,” Grandi told the opening of the Commission’s Executive Committee. “But remember, please: there has never been an easy year to be a refugee – and there never will be.”
He cited some bright spots and praised peace efforts led by the Trump administration in Congo, where the conflict has displaced millions of people.
At the United Nations General Assembly last month, the Trump administration – which Subsidy reduced this year For international humanitarian aid – Monument other countries In his view, the global asylum-seeking system has been abused and needs to be revamped, partly by cracking down on immigration.
last Traditional donors They reduced their aid expenditures for UNHCR this year.
In recent years, the agency has received nearly $5 billion annually — or half its budget requirements — even as conflict and repression in places like Afghanistan, Myanmar, Sudan, Venezuela and Ukraine have led the number of people fleeing their homes to nearly double over the past decade — to 122 million.
In today’s politically charged environment, Grandi said, “the (United Nations) situation Refugee conference and the principle of asylum on the table It would be a catastrophic mistake. He insisted that “national sovereignty and the right to seek asylum” were incompatible.
Grandi, whose term expires at the end of this year, has encouraged the erosion of respect for international law in some developed countries and noted that most refugees are taken by refugees.
“I am concerned that the current debate – in Europe, for example – and some of the current deportation practices – such as in the United States – face real challenges of ethics that are not consistent with international law,” he said.
Tommy Pigot, spokesman for the US State Department, defended US immigration and immigration policies and said Trump’s speech at the United Nations It was “a call to action against destructive policies that promote mass migration and illegal immigration that global bureaucrats have pushed for years.”
“Our actions are consistent with American law and the will of the American people, who demand a secure border and a legal immigration system,” Pigot said.
Grandi also cited some optimistic developments: more than a million refugees from Syria Now he’s back home. A ‘ray of hope’ has emerged in the eastern Congo conflict between Rwandan-backed forces and Congolese armed forces.
“Thanks to US-led peace efforts, instead of just talking about more bloodshed, or more refugees, we can start to think — cautiously, but more optimistically — about stability and return,” he said.