According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) report, Afghanistan has the third-largest refugee population and the region’s largest displaced population after the Taliban took control, with 2.7 million refugees scattered across 98 countries.
Following Syrian and Venezuelan refugees, Afghanistan has the largest displaced population, displaced internally or forced across the border, per UNHCR’s report.
Pakistan and Iran continue to shelter more than 1.3 million and 780,000 registered Afghan refugees, respectively and are host to the majority of Afghan refugees.
The UNHCR report quoted UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi saying, “Afghanistan’s displacement crisis is one of the largest and most protracted in UNHCR’s seven-decade history. We’re now seeing a third generation of Afghan children born in exile.”
This report indicates that in the year 2021 alone, 108,000 Afghans fled to Pakistan, 59,000 to Europe, 27,000 to Iran, and 6,000 fled to Asia and the Pacific.
A minimum of 24 million Afghans require humanitarian relief as a result of hunger, the country’s economic meltdown, natural disasters including floods, earthquakes, droughts and famine, a lack of development aid, and the brutally cold winters.
Afghans’ and their host communities’ capacity for resilience is being tested to the breaking point as the humanitarian crisis persists.
