Tag Archives: refugees
Rohingya refugees pray for justice as court to rule in genocide case
COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) – Rohingya refugees who fled persecution and violence in Myanmar are praying for justice as the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague prepares to deliver an initial verdict on Thursday in a genocide case filed against Myanmar. More than 730,000 Muslim Rohingya fled an army offensive in Myanmar’s Rakhine state in 2017. The United Nations says gang rapes and mass killings were carried out with “genocidal intent”.
Tennessee governor says state will keep resettling refugees
Tennessee won’t stop resettling refugees, Republican Gov. Bill Lee said Wednesday, rejecting the option offered to states by President Donald Trump’s administration. The issue forced Lee, who campaigned on his Christian beliefs, to consider his own experience helping refugees and weigh it against the will of fellow Republicans in the Legislature. GOP lawmakers had sued the federal government over its refugee resettlement program and legislative leaders hoped Lee would accept Trump’s offer.
Pakistan's Khan says millions of Muslim refugees could flee India
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Tuesday that millions of Muslims could flee India due to the curfew in the disputed territory of Kashmir and India’s new citizenship law, creating “a refugee crisis that would dwarf other crises”. “Our country will not be able to accommodate more refugees,” he added, urging the world to “step in now”.
Erdogan says Turkey will let refugees into Europe if EU does not support it
Turkey will have to open the doors to Europe for Syrian refugees unless the European Union provides Ankara with enough support, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday, adding that Turkey could not carry that burden alone. Turkey aims to establish a “safe zone” in northeast Syria, where it says up to 2 million Syrian refugees can settle once the region is cleared of the Kurdish YPG militia. Ankara has repeatedly urged the EU to help Turkey in hosting more than 3.5 million refugees.
California fires, rising seas: Millions of climate refugees will dwarf Dust Bowl by 2100
Erdogan Threatens Europe With Refugees After Syria Criticism
(Bloomberg) — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to send millions of Syrian refugees settled in Turkey to Europe, as he bridled at criticism of his military offensive against Kurdish fighters.“If you try to define our operation as an invasion, then our job becomes easy,” Erdogan said on Thursday at a gathering of his ruling party in Ankara. “We open the gates and send the 3.6 million refugees to you.”The president has stepped up attacks in recent months on a deal he struck with the European Union, which included Turkey receiving 6 billion euros ($ 6.6 billion) in aid and other as yet undelivered enticements in return for preventing the movement of migrants. But the stinging condemnation of Turkey’s incursion into northern Syria this week has provoked Erdogan’s harshest reaction in years.“Those who turn a blind eye to all the developments in Syria and make a habit of only criticizing Turkey — we invite them to reason, conscience and morality,” he said.Turkey sees the Kurdish militia as a threat to its security due to its links to separatist Kurds battling the Turkish military. It wants to drive the group from a border zone and then resettle at least 1 million displaced Syrians on the strip of territory. But European officials and others have denounced the offensive for opening another front in Syria’s conflict and potentially fracturing international efforts to defeat Islamic State. Thousands of Kurdish fighters died taking a lead role in dismantling the jihadist caliphate.Migration to Europe has dropped off dramatically since more than a million asylum seekers entered the bloc four years ago, above all to Germany. But not before the influx redrew the EU’s political map, driving a wedge between member states and fueling a rise in far-right populism that exploited social anxiety in the aftermath of the financial crisis.There has been a recent swell of asylum seekers crossing the western Aegean Sea, a sign of trouble in the arrangements hashed out with Turkey that eventually staunched the flow of arrivals during the crisis of 2015 and 2016.A new influx, even if nowhere near the same scale, has the potential to stir up trouble for European leaders such as Germany’s Angela Merkel, who suffered from the populist backlash against her open-door policy.\–With assistance from Taylan Bilgic.To contact the reporter on this story: Onur Ant in Istanbul at oant@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net, Mark Williams, Onur AntFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.