Forced displacement in the central Sahel reached new heights in 2022, with over 2.9 million refugees and internally displaced people across Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger and an emerging trend of Burkinabe seeking asylum southward and northward, including in North Africa and Europe.
Violence and conflict spilled over to coastal countries (Benin, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana and Togo), with several thousand new arrivals recorded. Given the complex interplay between conflict, climate change, food insecurity and widespread lack of socioeconomic opportunities, high levels of forced displacement are expected to continue into 2023.
In this volatile context, UNHCR will endeavour to stay and deliver a protection-centred emergency response. To better understand the risks and needs of people forced to flee and their host communities, UNHCR will seek to enhance protection monitoring through the regional inter-agency Project 21.
Registration, gender-based violence prevention, risk mitigation and response, child protection, education, civil documentation (including for those at risk of statelessness) and the provision of shelter and core relief items will be integral to the emergency response.
Along mixed movement routes, reinforcing community-based identification and referral mechanisms and providing young people with opportunities will be essential to offer alternatives to risky onward movements. In the coastal countries, UNHCR will increase its emergency preparedness by implementing or updating contingency plans, building capacity and increasing coordination with governments and partners through a regional situational emergency training.
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UNHCR will continue to work with governments to improve the protection environment and find durable solutions, including achieving the goals of the #IBelong Campaign to end statelessness by 2024.
All opportunities for solutions will be explored, including local integration, voluntary repatriation where the conditions for a safe and dignified return are met, and resettlement for the most vulnerable refugees. Partnering with local and national responders, UNHCR will invest in existing community-based structures and seek to mainstream climate action as part of its response. Strategic partnerships with development actors will focus on initiatives that will help to unlock such solutions for the displaced. At the regional level, UNHCR will continue its engagement with UN-wide coordination mechanisms such as the UN Integrated Strategy for the Sahel and will advance opportunities for the Sahel as part of the Regional Collaborative Platform.
A Guest Editorial
