As World Refugee Day approaches on June 20th, expect to see more stories like this one about the plight of a growing number of refugees (they are always growing, so nothing new there!) whose movement is blocked not by racist border restrictions, but by the Chinese Virus that has closed borders since late March.
On March 22nd the United Nations, with its branch called the International Organization for Migration that facilitates refugee travel, shut down almost all refugee movement.
Indeed it had to because 150 countries have closed their borders completely or have strict requirements for movement across them.
I had been wondering if the UN is restarting the flow, but apparently not.
The story atStuffis mostly about New Zealand that had just begun in earnest to ‘welcome’ the third world when COVID began its deadly spread.
But, here are a couple of bits that interested me besides learning that the UN continues to be responsible for the moratorium, not Donald Trump as I see most days in the US media.
Scores of refugees in limbo as quota system in holding pattern due to Covid-19
As we approach World Refugee Day on June 20 we have the highest number of refugees worldwide than ever before.
According to the latest UNHCR figures, there are 70.8 million forcibly displaced people, including more than 41 million internally displaced people and 25 million refugees.
Only 1 per cent of those 25 million refugees are resettled. That number is now at zero because of Covid-19.
More than 150 countries have closed their borders or put in border restrictions.
The vast majority of them have no exceptions for people claiming asylum.
They have no exceptions for refugees who need to flee their countries because of persecution, human rights abuses or war to be able to bypass border restrictions connected to Covid-19.
Flow of money is stopping too!
Rarely do we hear about the amount of money that refugees and migrants send HOME from the country where they have migrated to—money lost to the host country’s economy.
Migrant workers would not able to send money home to support their families and communities in their countries. The economic impact on those migrant workers and the decline in their livelihoods is going to have a massive impact on remittances, he adds.
“Latest figures are that remittances will go down $100 billion globally.”
For our many new readers, you may not know that international Leftists and NO borders advocates are pushing the meme that there are millions of so-called ‘climate refugees’ that must be taken into first world countries as refugees because the climate is changing where they now live.
You are probably laughing at how ridiculous this sounds, but believe me the issue is getting legs especially now that the Vatican is weighing in. Watch for it! The next big hue and cry will be for the US and other first world countries to save climate refugees! Photo here: http://www1.american.edu/ted/ICE/maldives.html
Sensibly, New Zealand’s Supreme Court has ruled that, in an important test case, the man claiming that he would suffer harm if returned to the island nation of Kiribati must be deported. He is not a refugee.
Remember the other day, Imentionedthat in order for someone to be alegitimate refugee they must prove they would be PERSECUTEDif returned to their country of origin and that Obama and his minions in the US State Department are working day and night to eviscerate refugee protection programs by deeming the ‘children’ from Central America as refugees when they are no such thing.
Economic migrants, people trying to escape crime or changes in the weather are NOT refugees.
Thankfully, in this case, the New Zealand court is demanding adherence to the long-standing definition of the word “refugee.”
From Sky News:
A Pacific Islander who applied to the New Zealand government to give him status as the world’s first climate refugee has had his appeal turned down.
Ioane Teitiota, 38, argued he should not be sent back to the island nation of Kiribati because it was under threat due to rising seas.
That, he argued, made it unsafe for him and his family.
However, while NZ’s Supreme Court agreed that the tiny nation of about 100,000 people was suffering environmental degradation, it said Mr Teitiota’s application did not meet the legal definition of a refugee because he was not facing persecution.
“While Kiribati undoubtedly faces challenges, Mr Teitiota does not, if returned, face ‘serious harm’,” the Supreme Court said in a ruling released on Monday.
Unfortunately, the court left the door open for a better test case.
In other ‘climate refugee’ news….
* Ireland’s President says we need to save climate refugees,here. This made me laugh because I envisioned some Irishman claiming he was a climate refugee in someplace like Tahiti because it was just too darned cold and rainy in Ireland!
* In a new report, the Leftists in Norway say there were 20 million climate refugees around the world in 2014, here.
* And, finally, a good piece at the Washington Post of all places debunking this as another Leftist scare tactic, here. Love it!
For more of this ridiculousness, see our ‘Climate refugees’ category going back several years, here.
The Otago district on the Southern island of New Zealand. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otago
New Zealand, mostly due to its location, has dodged the refugee/asylum-seeker bullet so far, but a movement is afoot to open New Zealand to the joys of diversity by increasing slowly (at first) the number of refugees it would accept from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Here is an editorial at the Otaga Daily Times. Remember readers that the UN is not pressuring Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, or China to accept refugees—it is really only western countries that are being pressured into opening their borders to masses from the third world.
A cry is regularly made for New Zealand to increase its refugee quota. This country each year accepts approximately 750 through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
[….]
But, as a good global citizen, for our own respect and because of our leadership position as a member of the United Nations Security Council, New Zealand can do more.
Prime Minister John Key has been resisting any such push.
In this he might be close to the pulse and fears of many New Zealanders, whatever the majority of publicised views.
[….]
A rapid increase in numbers accepted could well undermine the goodwill and capacity of the community – volunteers do a lot of work with refugees – and leave many with insufficient support and set up to fail.
What could be achieved, however, is a careful and staged increase at first to, say, 1000 a year and then beyond.
To our New Zealand readers, you must say NO to this idea. Tell them you will consider 1,000 when Saudi Arabia takes in (permanently!) 1,000 impoverished African Muslims! Or, when the Chinese give shelter and citizenship to 1,000 Syrians! (That won’t happen until hell freezes over!)
An afterthought! For comparison, don’t forget that the US is being pressured into taking 65,000 Syrians before the end of 2016, in addition to the 70,000 refugee flow from around the world we normally get.
I’ve been thinking lately that we need other demographic researchers to either back Pew or challenge Pew on its findings on the spread of Islam to the West. I don’t like relying on one organization (related to Pew Charitable Trust that I know for a fact leans Left).
Australian Muslims celebrate EID in Australia. http://www.ozzienews.com/news/australian-muslims-celebrate-the-end-of-ramadan/
Ijust now told commenter, FatherJon, that maybe Australia would be alone one day in standing against the Muslim migration (since the government there has been steadfastly turning the illegal alien boats away).
I don’t know why this old news popped up in my alerts today, but since it is before the Abbott government took on the boat people, maybe there is still hope for Australia! Will it be Australia Alone?
After Paris it became clear that Pew and others need to get on the stick and begin revising their out-dated demographic data!
THE number of Muslims in Australia will grow four times more quickly than non-Muslims over the next 20 years as the continued instability in developing Islamic countries in Southeast Asia drives migrants and refugees to these shores.
A major new study by the US-based Pew Research Centre has forecast a global surge in the Muslim population, with Australia and New Zealand among the nations expected to see the biggest rises.
In Australia, the Muslim community will grow from about 399,000 to 714,000 by 2030, an increase of 80 per cent.
In that time the non-Muslim population will increase by about 18 per cent.
This trend is even more dramatic in New Zealand, where there will be a 150 per cent rise in residents who adhere to Islam.
The projections, by the Pew Research Centre’s Forum on Religion and Public Life, have been calculated using fertility, mortality and migration rates.
But while the study confirms the continued spread of the Islamic faith — Muslims will comprise 26.4 per cent of the world’s population of 8.3 billion in 2030 — it anticipates that this growth will level off.
As living standards rise, more Muslims gravitate towards cities and women gain access to education and employment, the fertility rates in these communities will fall.
Bob Birrell, a sociologist and immigration expert from Monash University, said that while Middle East migration had plateaued, the forecast rises were “very plausible”. Family reunion, the refugee program and high levels of net migration would contribute to the growth, especially with the pressures to migrate in countries such as Indonesia, Pakistan and Malaysia, he said.
The Muslim population in Australia would still remain relatively low. At present, Muslims comprise 1.9 per cent of all Australians. That figure will rise to 2.8 per cent.
Don’t get too comfy! My guess is that the tipping point of the ‘civilization jihad’ for a country comes at around 3%—the point where the Muslim population is emboldened and begins to demand shariah compliance.
For the first time, New Zealand officials have accepted a refugee application by a family from Tuvalu that cites global warming as the reason they can’t return to their sinking Pacific island nation. Although there are other reasons why their application was accepted, including their previous time spent living in New Zealand, it is a significant first step towards countries dealing with climate change refugees. “I do see the decision as being quite significant,” Environmental law expert Vernon Rive told the New Zealand Herald .
The International Refugee Convention still does not recognize climate change as a legitimate cause for displacement, though some have seen the Tuvalu family’s acceptance as a sign that things might be about to change.
We have 36 previous posts in our ‘climate refugee’ categoryfor your further reading pleasure. You should know that environmentalists are at loggerheads with the “humanitarians” on the issue of changing international refugee law to add the weather as an excuse for the creation of more refugees in need of placement in the first world.
The international Left is jumping for joy because New Zealand has recognized a first “refugee” family to escape global warming.