UN Refugee Commissioner Warns of Growing Challenges in Responding to Conflict

The humanitarian community is “not entirely prepared” for growing challenges facing the world in the next two or three decades, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres has said.

In his keynote address at InterAction’s 2013 Forum, Guterres said the fracturing of power relations in the post-Cold War period is undermining humanitarian operations and the prospect of long-term peace. Consensus is becoming harder to achieve as a result.

“Today, unpredictability is the name of the game. The capacity of the humanitarian community to prevent conflicts is now very limited,” he said.

Guterres said the ongoing crisis in Syria points to the international community’s inability to produce a common plan to resolve protracted wars. The Syrian conflict has now stretched beyond the two-year mark, with no clear end in sight.

The total number of registered Syrian refugees has reached over 1.3 million, straining resources in neighboring Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon. Meanwhile, humanitarian needs inside the country are soaring. The UN’s Emergency Relief Coordinator Valerie Amos told the Security Council on April 18 that 6.8 million Syrians within the country require aid.

Worldwide, the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) hit 28.8 million in 2012, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), the highest ever recorded figure. Enduring violence in places like Syria, Somalia, Afghanistan and the DRC is making it more difficult for IDPs to return home.

The “doctrine of austerity” is also undercutting the ability to respond to these prolonged crises.

“Humanitarian aid budgets are not growing proportionally to humanitarian needs,” Guterres said. “We are seeing how difficult it is to mobilize resources to address the dramatic impact of the Syrian crisis. We will be called to do more and more with less.”

See other coverage of Guterres' remarks on Monday by NPR, The Guardian and ChildFund International, an InterAction member.

Contributed by Ellis Tsang