News stories 2011

© UNHCR/S.Phelps

In 2011, the Nordic countries taken together have contributed USD 270 million to UNHCR’s global operations.

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© UNHCR / J. Berglund

Find out why the award-winning Finnish film director Aki Kaurismäki wanted to make a film about refugees and illegal immigrants coming to Europe.

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© Yamina Djoudi

The LEGO Foundation donated one full container of LEGO bricks to the children of Tindouf camps. Guess what refugee children’s active minds produced?

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© © UNHCR/Jean-Marc Ferré

UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres warns that the nature of forced displacement is changing rapidly.

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© UNHCR/ Alessandra Garusi

The festival offered the audiences films and workshops on refugees and migrants, identity and culture. To be repeated next year!

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© UNHCR/D.Marie

UNHCR chief reaffirms commitment to preventing and responding to violence against displaced women and girls, while stressing the scale of the problem.

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© UNHCR

Did you know that every minute 8 people flee their homes to escape conflict or persecution? We believe that even 1 person forced to flee is too many.  Do you? Then add your voice!

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© UNHCR

The Swedish Forum for Human Rights at Kulturhuset in Stockholm 14-15 November attracted more than 2000 students and representatives from academia, civil society, government, authorities, municipalities and media. A jamboree of ideas and debate under the overall heading "Unlimited rights? Migration, citizenship and human rights". UNHCR participated in force.

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© UNHCR/G.M.B.Akash

The Swedish Forum for Human Rights is the largest and most important meeting place in the Nordic countries for people working with or interested in human rights issues.

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© UNHCR/Jack Ryan

Our face-to-face fundraisers give Swedish residents the opportunity to make a real difference to the lives of some of the world’s most vulnerable people.

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© UNHCR / J Tanner

At the annual Nansen Refugee Award ceremony, UNHCR pays tribute to the award winner from Yemen and to actress Angelina Jolie for 10 years' service.

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© Bose

Thanks to a generous donation from the Danish toymaker LEGO Group, refugee children are encourage to identify colours and place building bricks in a logical way.

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© UNHCR

If you watch TV in Sweden in the month of October you might happen to see short ads for UNHCR aired during the breaks. UNHCR is running a campaign to raise awareness and raise funds for our emergency work. 

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© UNHCR/ Jack Ryan

A new and unknown life in Finland awaits Ruti, a 71-year-old refugee from Myanmar, who has spent the past 14 years together with his wife Pote in Tham Hin, a UNHCR assisted refugee camp on the Thai-Myanmar border.

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© UNHCR/Katja Karppinen

UNHCR looked at the quality of the Swedish Migration Board's decision-making in asylum cases.

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© Ramsi photography, Yemen 2011

The Society for Humanitarian Solidarity has won this year's Nansen Refugee Award for its tireless work with boat arrivals along Yemen's coast.

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© UNHCR / L.Padoan

Access to sanitary materials is central to women’s dignity and self esteem. The lack of sanitary supplies can affect women’s health, but also their general mobility. Unfortunately, in a humanitarian emergency situation such as the crisis on the Horn of Africa, the risk is high that the provision of sanitary supplies becomes inadequate.

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© UNHCR / K. Karppinen

Purple, red, yellow, green...The colors of the rainbow are present everywhere on the streets of Stockholm; it is Pride-time! UNHCR Stockholm has listened in at some of this year’s seminars and lectures.

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© UNHCR

What does a retired employee in Billund and a five year old Somali refugee in Botswana have in common? Answer: a box of LEGO products - and lot’s of shared joy!

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© UNHCR/ L.Padoan

‘For the past two years our staff has been living in really difficult circumstances,’ says Jo Hegenauer, UNHCR’s head of office in Dollo Ado. ‘The new compound will give us a chance to experience some normality at the end of a hard day in the field.’

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© UNHCR/G.Constantine

The UN refugee agency today launches a global campaign to promote action against statelessness, a scourge for millions of people worldwide.

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© IOM (International Organization for Migration)

The PARE Project aimed to raise awareness of the situation of asylum seekers, refugees and migrants in Estonia.

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© UNHCR/ K.Rodriguez Norman

UNHCR spreads awareness about refugees at the world’s largest gathering of Scouts in Sweden with its “Passages” virtual reality exercise.

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© Glenn Jusnes

The 22nd World Scout Jamboree for scouts from all around the world is held between July 27 and August 8 in Rinkaby, Sweden.

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© Christian Als

UNHCR offices around the world on Thursday marked the 60th anniversary of the UN Refugee Convention – the legal foundation on which most of the agency's work worldwide is based.

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© UNHCR/G.Puertas

As chief of UNHCR's Public Health and HIV section, Dr Paul Spiegel has been in many emergencies. But what he saw at the Ethiopia border was shocking.

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© UNHCR

Somalia is at the heart of one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world today. Tens of thousands of Somalis are fleeing conflict and drought into Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya.

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© UNHCR/N.Bose

Salomon is among 145 refugees accepted by Sweden for resettlement from Sallum on the Egypt-Libya border. And yet, he does not dare to hope for the future he craves. "I am so happy that I have finally the opportunity to go to a better place," he said cautiously. "But I'm not going to believe it until I get there. My life might continue as before."

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© Georg Gyllenfjell (all photos)

The future of Europe’s migration and asylum policy was discussed in Gotland during the annually held Almedalen week, taking place 4-10 July this year.

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© UNHCR / G. Gordon / February 2011

UNHCR expresses its gratitude for the partnership with Lions and their charitable efforts for refugees worldwide.

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© UNHCR/ Katja Karppinen

It may be Monday for most, but for us it is above all World Refugee Day. Monday the 20^th of June and the UNHCR turned the Stockholm’s Central station into a refugee camp.

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© Christian Als

The World Refugee Day, 20 June 2011 will be commemorated all over the world. In Sweden the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) will arrange a big event at Centralen in Stockholm to make visible the millions of people displaced worldwide.

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© Magnum and UNHCR / Moises Saman

As part of its 60th anniversary activities, UNHCR has teamed up with the prestigious Magnum Photos to celebrate the lives of refugees and their impact on Europe over the past six decades.

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Photo: Rune Eraker

The Nansen Conference on Climate Change and Displacement in the 21st Century convened by the Norwegian Government on 6 and 7 June 2011, in Oslo, gathered together academic experts, representatives of governments, international agencies and civil society, with the objective of arriving at a set of recommendations for action.

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© UNHCR / A. Duclos

The conflict in Libya has triggered a massive outflow of people to neighbouring countries, especially to Egypt and Tunisia. By the end of May 2011, close to 900,000 men, women and children had fled across the Libyan border, many with injuries and harrowing stories to tell.

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© UNHCR/H. Mathisen

The exhibition TRANSIT - with Espen Rasmussen’s photos and videos of refugees and displaced the world over opened at the Nobel Peace Center in Oslo on 12 May 2011.

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© UNHCR/J. Berglund

On 17 May 2011, the Constitutional Committee of Estonia’s Parliament Riigikogu and UNHCR Regional Office for the Baltic and Nordic countries launched the UNHCR-Inter-Parliamentary Union’s ‘Nationality and Statelessness: A handbook for Parliamentarians’ in Tallinn.

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© UNHCR/J. Berglund

If you are stateless you are technically not a citizen of any country. As a stateless person you are often denied basic rights and access to employment, housing, education and health care.

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© Ministry of the Interior

This year the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees turns 60. It is also 20 years since the reception of asylum-seekers started in Finland. To celebrate these anniversaries the Ministry of the Interior and the Finnish Immigration Service arranged a commemorative seminar in Helsinki in late April. The event was opened by Tarja Halonen, President of the Republic of Finland.

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© Akvile Monkeviciute

This is the second year the Moot court competition is arranged. It is organized by the Lithuanian Red Cross society. Refugee law is not a compulsory subject in law studies in Lithuania, therefore few students are interested in it, or decide to work in this field.

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© UNHCR / J. Berglund

Nine immigrant women from all around the world are gathered in a small basement in Helsinki. Some have been advised to come here by a social worker, some got a tip from a friend and some have tried many language courses but have been disappointed. They all have at least two things in common: they live in Finland and they do not know Finnish.

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© Paul Hansen

Celebrated soprano Barbara Hendricks has been an advocate for refugees for 24 years. As Honorary Goodwill Ambassador for Life of the UN refugee agency she has met displaced persons, humanitarian workers and political leaders the world over.

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© UNHCR

The asylum trends in the Nordics give far from a consistent pattern. In 2010 the number of asylum-seekers arriving to Finland and Norway dropped significantly compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, in Denmark, Iceland and Sweden substantially more persons applied for asylum. The applicants’ nationalities also vary among the Nordics. In the Baltic countries the number of asylum-seekers remained low.

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© UNHCR/A.Duclos

Concluding a two-day visit to Tunisia, the heads of UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration called for continued international momentum as people continue to flee Libya by the thousands.

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© UNHCR/F.Courbet

UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres marked the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day with a call for greater access to education and training for forcibly displaced women and girls around the world.

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© UNHCR / A. Duclos

The number of civilians fleeing the violence in Libya to Tunisia has dropped significantly since Wednesday afternoon. Compared to earlier in the week when between 10,000 and 15,000 people were crossing into Tunisia daily, less than 2,000 made it across yesterday. UNHCR is very concerned that the security situation in Libya may be preventing people from fleeing.

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© UNHCR

Do you know a person or organization that has shown extraordinary dedication and service to the refugee cause? Watch our special Nansen Refugee Award video and make a nomination for this year's prize.

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© UNHCR / H.Mathisen

Espen Rasmussen’s refugee photos punch you in the stomach and leave you begging for more.

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Do you believe that you are free of prejudices? If your answer is yes, you might want to think again. 

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The Steps To Freedom project (STF), set to improve conditions for asylum-seekers in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, recently visited Sweden for a closer look at Swedish detention practice.

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© UNHCR/Jessica Påfs

When the European Commission’s Representation in Sweden invited the public to “Kaffe & Kommissionär” with European Union Commissioner for Home Affairs, Swedish Cecilia Malmström, earlier this month, many had to be turned away at the door.

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© UNHCR/Andrei Arjupin

UNHCR and the State Border Guard in Latvia have agreed to cooperate to ensure more protection-sensitive borders in Latvia. The aim is to support access for asylum-seekers to Latvia and the country’s asylum procedure.

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