UN registers 100 million refugees worldwide | DW News

now a record 100 million people across

the world have been forced to flee their

homes that's according to the latest u.n

figures the war in ukraine as well as

new or continuing emergencies in places

such as ethiopia afghanistan and congo

have all contributed to this staggering

figure and more often than not it's

private initiatives that help those

fleeing now to mark world refugee day

which is today we have this report from

the croatian capital zagreb where

volunteers have started a non-profit to

support refugees and migrants

the iu serious free shop is open twice a

week for refugees and the needy here

people can get clothing at no charge

when we came here we almost lost

everything to you just to came here

thousands of migrants arrive in croatia

every year many say that after arriving

they were again expelled forcibly and

illegally back out of the eu across the

bosnia croatian border

yet some still make it here

okay

in the whole

route that they passed the whole journey

that they had this is one of the rare um

places where people like to come back

because nobody is judging them here

many people come not only for the

donated goods but also just to drink

coffee talk to each other to play

they come from syria afghanistan cuba

and other places but recently we are

told donations for migrants dried up

the reason many croatians are donating

only for ukrainian refugees

in that way i know everybody forget that

we still have

other people here refugees who also need

help

even some ukrainian refugees brought the

nations because they themselves had

received too much

some of those donations went to russians

who had fled to croatia

most of the people that we talked with

are the mixed couples so russian and

ukrainian or people who just didn't

agree with

what is happening

in ukraine and russia

the free shop also wants to have recent

arrivals integrate into the creation

community many donors are croatian and

have been coming to help for years such

as ivana borosich

in our human being that we should help

people who are in need

the mood out in front of the free shop

is cheerful and relaxed

after journeys that for some have taken

years it's a bit of normal life for

people far from home

matthew saltmarsh works with the united

nations refugee agency and he joins me

from geneva in switzerland hi matthew

welcome to dw so an interesting

observation in the report that we just

saw plenty of donations for ukrainian

refugees but next to no donations for

anyone else is this something that

you've experienced too

well it's true that there has been a

huge outpouring of compassion and

support for ukrainian refugees and of

course we've seen that with european

countries opening their borders allowing

temporary protection

and you know hundreds of thousands of

people across europe and beyond opening

their doors and and giving financial

support as well and that's been really

positive and we welcome that but we do

have that concern that came up in your

report that other parts of the world

refugee situa situations refugee crises

in other regions particularly africa the

middle east

and central and south america

could be affected in the sense that so

much funding is going to the ukraine uh

that there may well be less at the end

of the year for those other situations

and of course it's desperately needed by

in many many places

now what's the most realistic outlook

for

ukrainian refugees say

well of course it's very difficult to

say there's five million who have

registered as refugees and then there's

approximately seven million who are

displaced within the country and of

course so much depends on the fighting

and the evolution of the fighting how

long that lasts whether it's contained

to those eastern areas or whether it

spreads again so i think everything

really depends on that for the moment

some of the refugees have chosen to go

back

some of them have jobs and if they're in

safer areas they've gone back to check

their houses and so on but a lot of time

that's not sustainable and there are

still people who are going back and then

coming back across the borders uh to

stay in europe

let's talk a little bit about this this

distinction that we touched on before

between ukrainian refugees and people

fleeing from other places

how are you looking at it and how are

you approaching it and dealing with it

well obviously there's been this this

huge outpouring of support particularly

in europe it's the neighboring countries

it's the neighboring region to ukraine

and that makes sense but our overriding

message for this world refugee day which

is today as you mentioned is that

everyone has the right to claim asylum

no matter where they are no matter what

they do no matter how they travel or

move and of course we've seen examples

in the past in europe but also in other

regions of refugees not being given that

access to asylum so our overriding

message really is of course

provide that asylum to anyone who who

needs it and who's seeking it um and

that's the best thing that that can be

done by states for refugees now matthew

you've mentioned it before that there's

been this outpouring of compassion um

towards ukrainian refugees amid this

exodus um but how optimistic are you

that this tra this trend will continue

well we dearly hope of course that it

will i think we've shown the potential

of support for refugees and of course

it's now

up to those countries to welcome the

refugees to allow them to integrate uh

and and so far the the signs are very

positive that that is happening the

countries in europe are offering access

to services to education to health

and so on of course there is a concern

that over time the longer that a

situation

drags on that welcome could wear a bit

thin but so far we haven't seen that but

of course let's not forget there are so

many other protracted refugee situations

uh where the outlook for refugees is

particularly dire we think of syria more

than 11 years now of conflict we think

of afghanistan four decades of conflict

and then we look across africa and

ethiopia and other regions so there are

still big concerns in those areas

matthew sault marsh with the united

nations refugee agency thank you

thank you

you