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Add to Preferred SourcesUnited Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi today praised Uganda’s continued commitment to hosting refugees and called for greater global support for the country’s progressive policies for helping the forcibly displaced.
In his address to the Uganda Solidarity Summit on Refugees, held in the capital, Kampala, the High Commissioner said Uganda continues to show “a profound commitment to enabling refugees to pursue self-reliance and live in dignity while in exile.”
The Summit was organized by the office of the UN Secretary-General António Guterres, together with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. About 500 delegates attended, including heads of state and government, members of the diplomatic corps, UN agencies, financial institutions and non-governmental organizations. The goal of the meeting is to give due recognition to Uganda’s generosity in hosting nearly 1.3 million refugees, and to call on the international community to do more The Secretary-General called on the international community to help Uganda shoulder the responsibility for so many refugees in the face of an emergency.
“International solidarity is not just a matter of solidarity. It is a matter of justice,” Guterres said.
In Uganda refugees are given land, allowed to work, own businesses and move freely. They are also integrated into government services like health care and education. But with more than half a million refugees from South Sudan crossing into Uganda over the last year, and more arriving everyday, the country’s resources are strained.
Uganda was one of the first countries to sign onto last year’s New York Declaration on Refugees and Migrants. Member states committed to developing a more comprehensive response to assisting refugees, to include humanitarian and development organizations, the private sector, host countries and the refugees themselves.
The High Commissioner said support for Uganda, which already maintained an inclusive refugee policy, is critical to “show that this model can work.” He said the world should not take Uganda’s generosity for granted “but instead, reinforce and nurture it, so that it may continue to flourish.”
By the conclusion of the summit more than US$358 million in support of Uganda was pledged.
Source: UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Read full information.
28 June, 2017