The number of people fleeing their homes because of war, violence and persecution has reached 114 million and is climbing because nations have failed to tackle the causes and combatants are refusing to comply with international law, the U.N. refugee chief said Thursday.
In a hard-hitting speech, Filippo Grandi criticized the U.N. Security Council, which is charged with maintaining international peace and security, for failing to use its voice to try to resolve conflicts from Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan to Congo, Myanmar and many other places.
He also accused unnamed countries of making “short-sighted foreign policy decisions, often founded on double standards, with lip service paid to compliance with the law, but little muscle flexed from the council to actually uphold it and – with it – peace and security.”
Grandi said non-compliance with international humanitarian law means that “parties to conflicts – increasingly everywhere, almost all of them – have stopped respecting the laws of war,” though some pretend to do so. The result is more civilian deaths, sexual violence is used as a weapons of war, hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure are attacked and destroyed, and humanitarian workers become targets, he said.
Calling himself a frustrated humanitarian and looking directly at the 15 council members, Grandi said that instead of using its voice, “the council´s cacophony has meant that you have instead continued to preside over a broader cacophony of chaos around the world.”
The high commissioner for refugees told the council it´s too late for the tens of thousands who have been killed in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan and other conflicts.
“But it is not too late to put your focus and energy on the crises and conflicts that remain unresolved, so that they are not allowed to fester and explode again,” Grandi said. “It is not too late to step up help for the millions who have been forcibly displaced to return home voluntarily, in safety and with dignity.” It´s also not too late to save millions of people from the scourge of war, the refugee chief said.
But the Security Council is increasingly polarized, and its five veto-wielding permanent members are at odds, with the U.S., Britain and France often strongly opposed to the views of Russia and China.
On the Gaza war, the council has not called for a cease-fire because of opposition from the United States, Israel´s closest ally. And on Ukraine, the council has been ineffective as Russia, a key party to the conflict after Moscow invaded its smaller neighbor in February 2022, would veto almost any resolution.