Prime Minister Emil Boc talking to a refugee child at the
Emergency Transit Centre in Timisoara, Romania.
Photo: Luki Velciov / UNHCR

Resettlement: Momentum in Europe is Building

Timosoara, Romania 10 March 2010 - Resettlement is undisputedly one of the most effective instruments for resolving refugee crises. But the number of places offered for resettlement still remains too small compared to the global need. In a meeting held in the Romanian city of Timisoara on 10 and 11 March, the Working Group on Resettlement discussed ways on how to increase the preparedness of receiving states to accept more refugees. The Romanian Prime Minister, Emil Boc opened the meeting stressing the importance of demonstrating solidarity through resettlement.

The Resettlement Working Group, a forum for consultations between UNHCR, states and aid organizations convened in Timisoara, the location of the first Emergency Transit Center - a facility that hosts refugees who have been urgently extracted from life-threatening situations. They can stay in Timisoara for up to six months until a final resettlement country has been identified.
Carin Bratt from the Ministry of Justice in Sweden reiterated her government's commitment to enlarge the pool of resettlement places worldwide as a matter of priority. Sweden, which currently chairs the consultative forum on resettlement, is promoting the establishment of a Joint EU Resettlement Programme.

Judith Kumin, UNHCR's Director for Europe, said in her opening remarks that the concept of emergency evacuation, first tried in Timisoara, has proven to be a feasible mechanism offering safety to endangered groups. It has meanwhile been replicated in Slovakia and the Philippines, where similar centres have been established.
What is needed after the evacuation is a lasting resettlement solution. In t his context Kumin welcomed the fact that in the past year 12 European countries, including ten EU Member States, implemented annual resettlement programs and four more resettled refugees on an ad hoc bases. This, Kumin said, was considerable progress compared to just a few years ago, and the momentum in Europe was clearly building.

The UN Refugee Agency is striving to increase the place of refugee resettlement in the global regime of international protection. In 2009, UNHCR submitted 129,000 refugees for resettlement, a steady increase from 99,000 in 2007. 84,000 refugees were actually resettled last year, with three traditional resettlement countries taking the lion's share (United States 62,000; Australia and Canada 6,500 each). The EU still plays a comparably small role in the global resettlement scheme with slightly less than 7,000 resettled persons in the entire EU in 2009.

The Government of Romania used the conference in Timisoara to lead by example. Not only has Romania offered a temporary safe haven for 500 evacuated refugees in the past year, but Interior Minister Vasile Blaga announced that Romania will resettle 40 Myanmar refugees coming from Malaysia as the first intake under Romania's new annual programme. The group is expected to arrive in Romania in early summer.

by Melita Šunjić, UNHCR