Refugees

Refugee: definition

Refugees are people who have left their homeland because they fear that they will lose their lives or their freedom if they stay. People become refugees because one or more of their basic human rights has been violated or threatened.

International law defines a “refugee” as a person who has fled from and/ or cannot return to his/her country due to a well- founded fear of persecution, including war or civil conflict.

A person is a refugee if

·         Refugees have to be outside their country or origin

·         The reason for their flight has to be fear of persecution

·         The fear of persecution has to be well founded, i.e. they have to experienced persecution or be likely to experience it if they return;

·         The persecution has to result from one or more of the five grounds listed in the definition.

·         They have to be unwilling or unable to seek the protection of their country.

Who protects refugees?

·         UNHCR

·         Protecting refugees is the core mandate of the UNHCR ( united nations high commissioner for refugees)

Who do they help?

By helping refugees go back home or to settle in another country, UNHCR also seeks lasting solutions to their plight.

Where are they involved?

UNHCR staff operate in some 120 countries around the world, from major capitals to remote. The largest portion of staff are based in countries in Asia and Africa, the continents that both host and generate the most refugees and internally displaced people. Among our biggest operations are Afghanistan, Chad, Colombia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan, Iraq and surrounding countries, and the Sudan. But we also have substantial operations in many other countries around the world.

Identify the top 10 countries & continents or concern, record their population?

1.  Asia – 18,567,061

2.  Africa- 10,475,567

3. Pakistan – 4,744,098

4. Thailand – 3,615,552

5. Dem republic Congo – 2,362,295

6. Iraq- 2,026,789

7. Somalia- 1,576,544

8. Sudan- 1,426,412

9. Syrian Arab republic – 1,357,546

10. Iran- 1,072,346

Use a world map image from google and mark these countries to the map and apply to your

8 Millennium Development Goals

Aus Aid – Millennium Goals

Goal	Target	Australia is doing...
1.       Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger	Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than $1.25	Halve extreme poverty by 2015. They are providing affordable housing.  In Bangladesh Australia is providing 1.6 million disadvantaged children with access to pre-primary and primary education.
2.       Achieve universal primary education The number of primary school- aged children who are out of school has declined from 115 million in 2002 to 75 million today.	Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary school education.	Australia has funned new schools in Laos. They have introduced teacher training.  They are providing nutritious food.
3.       Promote gender equality and empower women	Increase proportion of seats held by women in national parliaments. Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education.	Increasing Australian development scholarships for east Timorese women. Encouraging women in east Timor to register for jobs. Supporting leadership and governance training for women across the Asia pacific region.
4.       Reduce child mortality	Reduce by two thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate.	Training more skilled birth attendants in rural and remote PNG to help reduce infant deaths. Including births supervised by skilled staff is an important focus of the PNG- Australia Partnership for development. Working with governments and other donors to improve the supply of vaccines and immunisation globally.
5.       Improve maternal health	Reduce by three – quarters the maternal mortality rate. Achieve universal access to reproductive health	Helping to train the next generation of midmives and providing specialist surgical services and training in east timor. Supporting outreach clinics, which target remote and rural villages with information on health, nutrition, and family planning.
6.       Combat HIV/Aids	Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment to HIV/AIDS for all those who need it.	Committed up to $100 million to work in partnership with Indonesia to combat the spread of HIV and improve the quality of life for those living with the virus. Supporting needle syringe programs, voluntary counselling, testing and preventing services and programs.
7.       Ensure environmental sustainability	Halve the number of people without sustainable access of safe drinking water and basic sanitation.	Providing $150 million, through the international climate change, to help vulnerable countries in our region increase resilience to the unavoidable impacts of climate change.
8.       Development for a global partnership for development	N.A.P	Australia is working closely with developing countries and development partners to build global partnership with address poverty.

Phillipines

• The Phillippines is made up of more than 7,000 tropical islands and has a population of 90 million. The country has a tropical marine climate with a dry season (Nov- April) and a rainy season (May-Oct).
• The captil Manilla- Metro Manilla- is a sprawling cluster of 17 cities with municipalities such as Manilla, Quezon, Makati, Pasay, and so on generating a populace to guess at; perhaps start at ten million and keep counting.
• Manilla has a hight population density, with one district having over 68,000 people/km so at times it may feel a little crowed espcially if you have just arrived from London which has about 8,000 people/km.
• Tagalog is the national language and English is used for official/business purposes.
• There are 54 other languages with over 140 dialect variations.
• The Phillippines has the world's third largest English speaking population.

 "Etching out a life on Smokey Mountain" and write a reflection on the issues referred to in the article:

Smokey Mountain is a truly famous landmark, a landmark where thousands of people lie in poverty. Decomposed rubbish, stands more than 20 metres high, there is no man made paths just a rope dangling from the top and rubbish trodden path. Young children suffer from lack of hygiene; the risk of transmitting rabies is at a high rate. A house is considered bits of plastic and wooden materials, people live up on this mountain. The girls don’t have access to education anymore, simply as they cannot afford it, and their parents for a living are out scavenging for rubbish. There are still questions surrounding if parents force children to work instead of attending school.  This is the cycle of poverty, something one can sometimes not escape.