In a joint press release, IOM and UNHCR chiefs stressed that COVID-19 underlines the urgent need for universal health coverage that includes migrants, refugees and internally displaced and stateless people.

UNHCR and IOM jointly launched a USD 1.44 billion regional plan to respond to the growing needs of refugees and migrants from Venezuela and the communities hosting them. The onset of COVID-19 has dangerously strained national and local capacities across the region. Many refugees and migrants and their host communities now face a myriad of new challenges that worsen their already precarious conditions.

UNHCR warns that child trafficking, forced labour and forced recruitment by armed groups are increasing in Mali due to conflict, insecurity, COVID-19 and deteriorating economic conditions.

A new report released by the Norwegian Refugee Council and UNHCR-led Global Protection Cluster (GPC) finds that nearly 40 million people are at heightened risk of violence, discrimination and rights abuses as COVID-19 spawns a ‘coping crisis’.

In a press release UNHCR warns that the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic is driving further violence against refugee, displaced and stateless women and girls. The UNHCR-led Global Protection Cluster reported increases in gender-based violence in at least 27 countries. UNHCR is also alarmed by increased risks of child and forced marriages being resorted to as a coping strategy by displaced families buckling under socio-economic pressures.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), UNHCR has helped hundreds of refugees from the Central African Republic (CAR) to return home in recent days – the first such move since the COVID-19 pandemic forced border closures.