UNHCR Afghanistan Humanitarian Crisis

Some 400,000 people in Afghanistan have already been displaced by the violence this year. This latest crisis is only adding more suffering to an already tragic situation, in which over 5 million Afghans are displaced in the country and across borders.

The crisis is taking the heaviest toll on women and children, who make up 80% of Afghanistan’s refugees and internally displaced people. Alongside homelessness and the threat of violence, they’re facing drought, food scarcity, COVID-19 and a health system at breaking point.

UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is providing Afghans with emergency shelter, food, water, and health care, but their supplies are running dangerously low.

UNHCR urgently needs your help to scale up their supplies, so that they can help people trapped inside Afghanistan, as well as refugees forced to flee to neighboring countries.

Support UNHCR and help them with their efforts

HKD 1,140 could provide a kit of core relief items, including blankets, sleeping mats, jerrycans, a bucket, mosquito nets and kitchen set, to two Afghan refugee families in Pakistan

HKD 1,950 could provide 100 sleeping mats to those affected by the displacement crisis in Afghanistan

HKD 3,340 could provide an emergency shelter kit, which includes a family tent and 2 plastic tarpaulins, to a displaced family in Afghanistan

For more information please follow this link to the UNHCR website.

Donate: Follow this link to the UNHCR website to make a donation

About UNHCR: The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) was established on December 14, 1950 by the United Nations General Assembly.  The agency is mandated to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees and resolve their problems worldwide. On the following year on July 28th, the United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, the legal foundation of helping refugees and the basic statute guiding UNHCR’s work, was adopted.

The primary purpose of UNHCR is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country. The agency also has a mandate to help stateless people.

In an effort to protect refugees and to promote solutions to their problems, UNHCR seeks to reduce situations of forced displacement by encouraging states and other institutions to create conditions which are conducive to the protection of human rights and the peaceful resolution of disputes. UNHCR works in partnership with governments, regional organizations, international and non-governmental organizations to achieve these objectives.

UNHCR is an impartial organization, offering protection and assistance to refugees and others on the basis of their needs and irrespective of their race, religion, political opinion or gender. In all of its activities, UNHCR pays particular attention to the needs of children and seeks to promote the equal rights of women and girls.

Since 1950, UNHCR has helped tens of millions of people restart their lives. Today, a staff of more than 10,900 people in 130 countries continues to help and protect millions of refugees, returnees, internally displaced and stateless people.

UNHCR

The UN refugee agency emerged in the wake of World War II to help Europeans displaced by that conflict. By 1956 UNHCR was facing its first major emergency, the outpouring of refugees when Soviet forces crushed the Hungarian Revolution. In the 1960s, the decolonization of Africa produced the first of that continent’s numerous refugee crises needing UNHCR intervention. Over the following two decades, UNHCR had to help with displacement crises in Asia and Latin America. By the end of the century there were fresh refugee problems in Africa and, turning full circle, new waves of refugees in Europe from the series of wars in the Balkans.

The start of the 21st Century has seen UNHCR helping with major refugee crises in Africa, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Somalia, and Asia, especially the 30-year-old Afghan refugee problem. At the same time, UNHCR has been asked to use its expertise to help many internally displaced by conflict. Less visibly, it has expanded its role in helping stateless people, a largely overlooked group numbering millions of people in danger of being denied basic rights because they do not possess any citizenship. In some parts of the world, such as Africa and Latin America, the original 1951 mandate has been strengthened by agreement on regional legal instruments.

From only 34 staff members when UNHCR was founded, it now has 6,650 national and international members of staff, including 740 in UNHCR‘s Geneva headquarters. The agency works in 118 countries, with staff based in 108 main locations such as regional and branch offices and 151 often remote sub-offices and field offices. UNHCR now deals with 34.4 million people of concern to UNHCR: 14.4 million internally displaced people, 10.5 million refugees, 2 million returnees, 6.6 million stateless people and more than 800,000 asylum seekers.

The UNHCR office in Hong Kong was officially established in 1979 to cope with the influx of the Vietnamese Boat People. Today the UNHCR’s office in Hong Kong serves two purposes
Assistance: To assist asylum-seekers and refugees as well as the identification and promotion of durable solutions (mostly resettlement) under its mandate.
Fundraising: In 2007, UNHCR started private sector fundraising operation in Hong Kong. Money raised in HK is used to support the UN Refugee Agency’s humanitarian work to protect and assist refugees around the world.

Volunteering: There are a number of ways that you can help the UNHCR assist the millions of innocent victims around the world who have been forced to flee their homes in search of safety.
1. Clerical support, including data entry, lettershop, work the UNHCR office during office hour;
2. Translation, writing, editing and design work that you can work at home, and keep close communications with the UNHCR;
3. Assist in event activities, for example, setting up for the venue, selling at stalls, receiving visitors and journalists, etc.
4. Provide the UNHCR with your professional advice in public relations or co-organise event for the UNHCR.
For further information and to register as a volunteer, complete the volunteer form on their website.

The 4th Refugee Film Festival

Organized by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the 4th Refugee Film Festival will be taking place between June 19 to 23, 2011 at the Broadway Cinematheque. Featured films expose stories and lives of refugees from all around the world, bringing audience to know more about the hardship and difficulties they are encountering.

Support the invaluable work of the UNHCR and at the same time gain a better understanding about the lives and circumstances of refugees around the world.