by & nbspgavin Blackburn & nbspwith & nbspAP
It’s published
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said the number of people forced to displaced by violence and persecution around the world had risen to over 123 million by the end of 2024, up by about 2 million from the previous year.
According to UNHCR, figures recorded at the end of last year show that displacement has almost doubled over the past decade.
The report comes as humanitarian groups face budget cuts from the US and other traditional Western donors.
But UN refugee chief Filippo Grandi highlighted what he called the “Raise of Hope” in recent months, saying that nearly two million Syrians have returned to Japan as they emerge from more than a decade’s civil war.
The findings were released on Thursday alongside the UN Refugee Agency’s Global Trends Report. This was estimated by the end of April 2025 that the number of forced displaced people around the world had dropped slightly, down 1%, to 122.1 million.
Among those figures, at the end of last year, the number of people displaced internally increased from over 9% to 73.5 million.
The numbers represent cumulative figures of years of conflict, violence and persecution, including those who returned home last year, even if others fled.
The UNHCR said it countered the “wide perception of wealthy regions” that nearly two-thirds of those who fled across the border remain in their neighbours, and that the majority of people fled to reach places like Europe and the United States.
Important areas for displacement
The agency said that, torn by the civil war, Sudan is now the world’s largest refuge location, with over 14 million people uprooted and more than 13.5 million in Syria.
Many of those fleeing the ongoing conflict between the Sudanese army and the Paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have fled to neighbouring countries such as South Sudan, Chad and Egypt.
Over 10 million people have been forced to evacuate in Afghanistan. While aggressive fighting has largely stopped, UNHCR notes that widespread poverty and hunger persist, and that some countries are implementing policies to deport undocumented migrants, including Afghan citizens.
The report also points out that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine continues to encourage large-scale evacuation.
Approximately 8.8 million Ukrainians are evacuated to the battle, with 5.1 million people, within 3.7 million, 5.1 million people seeking evacuation from other countries.
