They fled war or natural disaster. In 2021, almost sixty million people had to move within their country, which is a record. The study (in English) made public Thursday, May 19 by several NGOs evokes precisely the figure of 59.1 million. In detail, nearly half were under 18, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center (IDMC) and the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).
It is the second highest annual figure in ten years, behind 2020, which had already seen a record number of displacements due to a series of natural disasters. And a new record is expected to be set for this in 2022 due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “The year 2022 promises to be dark”has already alerted the director of the IDMC, Alexandra Bilak.
The situation in the world “has never been so bad”observes for his part the general secretary of the NRC, Jan Egeland, who assures that “the world is falling apart”. “The situation today is much worse than our record number suggests. We need world leaders to make a titanic shift in their thinking about avoiding and settling conflict, to end this spiraling human suffering”he said.
