Syrian refugees line up as they wait to board a bus to take them home to Syria, in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2019. Hundreds of Syrian refugees have headed home in the first batch to leave Lebanon since protests broke out more than a month ago. Lebanon is hosting some 1 million Syrian refugees who fled their country after the war broke out eight years ago. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
The UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is holding its first Global Refugee Forum in Geneva, with hopes of implementing the Global Compact on Refugees, aimed at improving the lives of refugees and host communities.
The U.N. is urging governments and businesses to “reboot” their responses to refugees as more people flee their homes and often face hostility in new countries.
Here are some facts about the current state of the refugee crisis:
The United Nations registered more than 60 million displaced people in 2018.
Of them, 20.36 million were refugees, people who've fled their homes into another country, while about 41.43 million were internally displaced persons, people who fled their homes, but stayed inside their home countries.
The largest numbers of refugees came from Syria, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Myanmar, and Somalia as of 2018. Syria saw more than 6.6 million residents leave the country.
As to where refugees resettle, many are found not too far from where they originated. The U.N. says Turkey hosts the most refugees, at 3.5 million in 2017, with Pakistan, Uganda, and Lebanon following.
But Lebanon has the highest density of refugees, with 164 per 1,000 inhabitants at the end of 2017.
Many Western countries are admitting fewer refugees. The United States accepted a record low 22,491 refugees in 2018.