Refugee

:This article is for the group of people as defined by international law. For the description of "refugee" as casually used for any person who has been forced to leave their home, see displaced person.

Refugee groups

Boat people

Boat people is a term usually referring to impoverished illegal immigrants or asylum seekers who arrive en masse in old or crudely made boats. The term came into common use in the 1970s with the mass exodus of Vietnamese refugees following the Vietnam War.

Related Topics:
Boat people - Illegal immigrant - Asylum seekers - Boat - 1970s - Vietnam War

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It is a widely used form of migration for people migrating from Cuba, Haiti, Morocco, Vietnam or Albania. They often risk their lives on dangerously crude and overcrowded boats to escape oppression or poverty in their home nations. Events resulting from the Vietnam War led many people in Cambodia, Laos, and especially Vietnam to become refugees in the late 1970s and 1980s. In 2001, 353 asylum seekers sailing from Indonesia to Australia drowned when their vessel sank.

Related Topics:
Migration - Cuba - Haiti - Morocco - Vietnam - Albania - Poverty - Vietnam War - Cambodia - Laos - 1970s - 1980s - Indonesia - Australia - Vessel sank

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A danger to any given boat person is that the 'boat' he or she is riding may actually be anything that would float and was large enough for passengers. Although such makeshift craft are after sources of international tragedies, some strike amusing and optomistic notes. For instance, in 2003 some Cubans attempted (unsuccessfully, but safely) to reach Florida in a 1950s pickup truck made boyant by oil barrels strapped to its sides.

Related Topics:
Cuban - Florida - 1950s

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Boat people are frequently a source of controversy in the nation they seek to immigrate to, such as the United States, Canada, Italy, Spain and Australia. Boat people are often forcibly prevented from landing at their destination, such as under Australia's Pacific Solution, or they are subjected to mandatory detention after their arrival.

Related Topics:
United States - Canada - Italy - Spain - Australia - Pacific Solution - Mandatory detention

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Refugee movement in Europe

The majority of refugee movements in Europe have been due to political revolution and the subsequent oppression of nonconformist groups. The Russian Revolution in 1917 and the subsequent civil war (1917?1921) led to about 1,500,000 refugees, most of them fleeing the Communist government. In 1915 and 1923, more than 1,000,000 Armenians left Turkish Asia Minor due to a series of events now known as the Armenian Genocide.

Related Topics:
Russian Revolution - 1917 - Civil war - 1921 - Armenian - Turkish - Asia Minor - Armenian Genocide

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Several hundred thousand Spanish Republicans travelled to France after their loss to the Nationalists in 1939 in the Spanish Civil War.

Related Topics:
1939 - Spanish Civil War

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After the defeat of Germany in World War II, the Potsdam Conference authorized the expulsion of German minorities from a number of European countries, meaning that 12,000,000 ethnic Germans were displaced to the reallocated and divided territory of Allied-occupied Germany. Between the end of World War II and the erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961, more than 3,700,000 refugees from East Germany travelled to West Germany for asylum from the Soviet occupation.

Related Topics:
World War II - Potsdam Conference - Expulsion of German minorities - Ethnic German - Allied-occupied Germany - Berlin Wall - East Germany - West Germany - Soviet occupation

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Beginning in 1991, political upheavals in Eastern Europe such as the breakup of Yugoslavia, displaced about 2,000,000 people by mid-1992.

Related Topics:
1991 - Yugoslavia - 1992

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Refugee movements in Asia

Since World War II, Asia and the Middle East has been a large source of refugees.

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• The Korean War (1950?53) and the Chinese take-over of Tibet (1959) both caused the displacement of more than 1 million refugees.
• The partition of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan in 1947 resulted in the largest human movement in history, an exchange of 18,000,000 Hindus from Pakistan and Muslims from India. During the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, owing to the West Pakistani Army's Operation Searchlight, more than 10 million Bengalis fled to neighbouring India.
• Large numbers of Vietnamese refugees came into existence after 1975 when South Vietnam fell to the communist forces. Many tried to escape, some by boat, thus gaving rise to the phrase "boat people," and emigrated to Hong Kong, France, the United States, Canada, Australia, and other countries, creating sizable expatriate communities, notably in the United States.
• The Mien or Yao recently lived in northern Vietnam, northern Laos and northern Thailand. In 1975, the Pathet Lao forces began seeking reprisal for the involvement of many Mien as soldiers in a CIA-sponsored secret war in Laos. As a token of appreciation to the Mien and Hmong people who served in the CIA secret army, the United States accepted many of the refugees as naturalized citizens (Mien American).
• During the 1980s and early '90s, Afghanistan and the Afghan War (1978?92) caused more than 6,000,000 refugees to flee to the neighbouring countries of Pakistan and Iran, making Afghanistan the country with the greatest number of refugees. Iran also provided asylum for 1,400,000 Iraqi refugees who had been uprooted as a result of the Persian Gulf War (1990?91).

Refugee movements in Africa

Since the 1950s, many nations in Africa have suffered civil wars and ethnic strife, thus generating a massive number of refugees of many different nationalities and ethnic groups. The division of Africa into European colonies in 1885, along which lines the newly independent nations of the 1950s and 1960s drew their borders, has been cited as a major reason why Africa has been so plagued with intrastate warfare. The number of refugees in Africa increased from 860,000 in 1968 to 6,775,000 by 1992 (Encyclopædia Britannica, 2004). By the end of 2004, that number had dropped to 2,748,400 refugees, according to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees http://www.unhcr.ch/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/statistics/opendoc.pdf?tbl=STATISTICS&id=42b283744. (That figure does not include internally displaced persons, who do not cross international borders and so do not fit the official definition of refugee.)

Related Topics:
Africa - Civil war - Nationalities - Ethnic group - Europe - Colonies - 1885 - 1950s - 1960s - United Nations High Commission for Refugees - Internally displaced person

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Many refugees in Africa cross into neighboring countries to find safe haven; often, African countries are simultaneously countries of origin for refugees and countries of asylum for other refugees. The Democratic Republic of Congo, for instance, was the country of origin for 462,203 refugees at the end of 2004, but a country of asylum for 199,323 other refugees.

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Countries in Africa from where 5,000 or more refugees originated as of the end of 2004, arranged in descending order of numbers of refugees. (UNHCR, 2004 Global Refugee Trends, Table 3.)

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• Sudan: 730,612
• Burundi: 485,764
• Democratic Republic of Congo: 462,203
• Somalia: 389,272
• Liberia: 335,467
• Angola: 228,838
• Eritrea: 131,119
• Rwanda: 63,808
• Ethiopia: 63,105
• Chad: 52,663
• Sierra Leone: 41,801
• Uganda: 31,963
• Central African Republic: 31,069
• Congo: 28,152
• Nigeria: 23,888
• Côte d'Ivoire: 23,655
• Ghana: 14,767
• Togo: 10,819
• Zimbabwe: 9,568
• Senegal: 8,332
• Cameroon: 7,629

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Great Lakes refugee crisis

In the aftermath of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, over two million people fled into neighboring countries, in particular Zaire. The refugee camps soon came to be controlled by the former government and Hutu militants who used the camps as bases to launch attacks against the new government in Rwanda. Little action was taken to resolve the situation and the crisis did not end until Rwanda-supported rebels forced the refugees back across the border in the beginning of the First Congo War.

Related Topics:
1994 - Rwandan Genocide - Zaire - Hutu - Rwanda - First Congo War

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Refugees from Sudan

These refugees have fled either the longstanding and recently concluded Sudanese Civil War, or the situation in Darfur. They are housed mainly in Chad, Uganda, Ethiopia, and Kenya.

Related Topics:
Sudanese Civil War - Darfur - Chad - Uganda - Ethiopia - Kenya

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Haitians and Cubans

From 1991 through 1994, thousands of Haitians fled violence and repression in Haiti by boat. Although most were repatriated to Haiti by the U.S. government, many entered the United States as refugees. Most Haitians were primarily economic refugees from the grinding poverty of Haiti, the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

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Each year, dozens of Cubans risk their lives on inner tubes and make-shift boats to escape the political and harsh repression of the island's regime. Notable cases include the young boy Elian Gonzalez whose mother died at sea before reaching US shores and the group of Cubans who made a boat out of a 1950's Chevy.

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Although much has been made about the uneven treatment of Cubans and Haitians, the root reasons for migration are fundamentally different.

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Palestinians

:Main article: Palestinian refugee

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In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a Palestinian refugee is a refugee from Palestine created by the Palestinian Exodus, which Palestinians call the Nakba (نكبة, meaning "disaster").

Related Topics:
Israeli-Palestinian conflict - Refugee - Palestine - Palestinian Exodus - Palestinian - Nakba

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Many Palestinians had already become refugees by the time neighboring Arab states attacked the newly established State of Israel, and the exodus continued during the war until after the armistice that ended it (see Palestinian Exodus.) These refugees, the great majority of whom had lived there for generations, were generally not permitted to return to their homes.

Related Topics:
State of Israel - Palestinian Exodus - Refugee

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The final estimate of their number was 711,000, according to the United Nations Concilation Commission (General Progress Report and Supplementary Report of the United Nations Conciliation Commission for Palestine, Covering the Period from 11 December 1949 to 23 October 1950, http://domino.un.org/unispal.nsf/9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/93037e3b939746de8525610200567883!OpenDocument).

Related Topics:
United Nations - 11 December - 1949 - 23 October - 1950

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Palestinian refugees from 1948 and their descendants do not come under the 1951 convention or UNHCR, but under the earlier UNRWA agency. As such they are the only refugee population legally defined to include descendants of refugees. However, many other refugee populations (notably the Biharis) have remained in refugee camps for more than a generation, making their children refugees effectively if not legally.

Related Topics:
UNRWA - Bihari

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The Palestinian refugees claim a right of return, based on Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which reads: "Everyone has the right to leave any country including his own, and to return to his country."

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Palestinian refugee camps are in:

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• Gaza, 8 camps, 478,854 refugees
• Jordan, 10 camps, 304,430 refugees
• Lebanon, 12 camps, 225,125 refugees
• Syria, 10 camps, 119,776 refugees
• West Bank, 19 camps, 176,514 refugees