The UK should double the amount of refugees it takes in under resettlement programmes, the United Nations has urged. A senior official at the UN’s refugee agency said accepting around 10,000 refugees a year would be a “step change” for the UK.
Volker Turk, assistant commissioner at the UN High Commission for Refugees, said there was a need for countries around the world to “step up” to address the crisis. The Government has committed to take in 20,000 refugees by 2020 under a scheme set up to cover people fleeing the Syrian conflict, with 5,453 granted humanitarian protection under the programme in the year ending March 2017, and 3,000 vulnerable children and family members. But Mr Turk, who was in London for talks with ministers, said he hoped the Government’s response would be “significantly” expanded after 2020: “It would be a doubling.”
In an interview with the Press Association, Mr Turk: Urged the Government to do more to end detention of asylum seekers. Hit out at “irresponsible” rhetoric from Western politicians. Praised the response of British communities which have received refugees.
Mr Turk said he wanted to see “significant numbers” of refugees offered the chance of a new life in the UK after 2020, with a resettlement programme open to people fleeing trouble spots around the world, not just Syria. After his talks with ministers he said: “We had good discussions about possible ideas about what can be done post-2020 and the Government is open to discussing this and to learn the lessons from what is ongoing at the moment. “We hope very much that there will be a regular resettlement programme by Britain past 2020 in significant numbers.” The aspiration was for it to cover 10,000 refugees or more, effectively doubling the current rate.
Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/un-uk-refugees-take-in-100…
