Every minute, 20 people have to leave everything behind to escape war, hunger, persecution or terror.
 

There are around 80 million displaced people in the world, the highest number ever. Double what they were 10 years ago. They are 1% of the world population and 40% are minors.
 

Our world is becoming more and more dangerous for more and more people. It is not, in fact, a world for everyone. Not even at the minimum level.

A refugee is a person who has good reason to feel threatened because of their race, nationality, religion, political opinion or membership in a certain social group. A threat from a natural disaster may also require some people to seek refuge.

A refugee is therefore a threatened person, subject to serious violations of human rights. As the right to life is an elementary right, a refugee has the right to be sheltered where he is not threatened.

As basic needs – food, water, sanitation and health care – are part of the minimum living conditions and human dignity, refugees need care and assistance from others.

A refugee is a person. It is important to repeat it. It has in itself the dignity of the human being. But it has around it the lack of recognition, or worse, the aggression to the human that should be respected. A refugee is not just a person wanting to improve their life. He is someone whose life is radically threatened. That's why he seeks refuge.

This enormous humanitarian challenge, visible in the waters of the Mediterranean, in the Greek islands and in vast refugee camps from Bangladesh to Uganda, shows us every day how humanity's most serious crises really are linked.

Reducing emissions to zero, addressing the threat of global pandemics, promoting climate justice, fighting corruption, strengthening the rule of law, and seeking peaceful solutions to conflict are critical to preventing the kind of forced displacement we've seen in recent years.

More than two-thirds of global refugees are staying in neighboring countries, many of whom have been attacked by COVID-19 and the resulting economic and social struggles.

While some countries, like Colombia, are taking great strides to integrate millions who arrived with little more than the clothes they wore, those countries need all the support they can get. Western nations must strive to share responsibility for protecting refugees.

This extends to policies and practices, ensuring safe passage for asylum seekers and accelerating integration, access to education and the right to work so that refugees can rebuild their lives and livelihoods.

Given what we know about the net contribution refugees have shown to make to their new communities, I have always seen integration as an opportunity - a social investment that is worth driving growth, prosperity and diversity and enriching host societies in countless ways.

Faced with this huge problem, we are ALL called to take a stand and do something:

1 – Do not ignore the problem, nor let yourself fall into indifference regarding the threats that give rise to refugees;

2 – Contribute monetarily to refugee support organizations;

3 - Political pressure on governments and party forces that are at the origin or support situations that force 20 people per minute to seek refuge for their threatened life.

4 – Participate in a public opinion favorable to the reception of refugees and help with the integration of refugees who are close to you.

5 – Adopt measures to care for the environment, as one of the great origins of refugees is environmental problems, whose solution involves changes in the behavior of each one of us.

Our (bad) habits threaten and kill, albeit at a distance, far from our eyes.

 “We see, we hear and we read / We cannot ignore”, said Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen.