Mission USA for UNHCR is an independent nonprofit organization that provides support for the humanitarian work of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) through fundraising and education. The organization supports refugee protection and relief programs around the world, meeting needs by providing resources to the world's most vulnerable people. USA for UNHCR also informs Americans about the plight of refugees and the lifesaving work of the UN Refugee Agency.  

Programs USA for UNHCR supports UNHCR's lifesaving operations around the world to protect refugees, internally displaced people, and former refugees who are returning home. In more than five decades, the agency has helped an estimated 50 million people restart their lives. Today, a staff of approximately 6,300 people in more than 110 countries continues to help 32.9 million persons--providing protection, shelter, clean water, health services, education, and other humanitarian assistance. USA for UNHCR helped fund emergencies and ongoing operations in Sudan (Darfur), Afghanistan, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Iraq as well as many other countries. The organization also provides public outreach through special events, quarterly publications, and daily updates on our website, www.UNrefugees.org.

The UN Refugee Agency is battling the elements, massive logistics obstacles and daunting security challenges to help hundreds of thousands of people uprooted by the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region.  How bad is it? Over the past three years nearly 200,000 innocents have been killed – massacred, raped, or become victims of disease.  Two million have been forced from their homes, including 240,000 Sudanese refugees who have fled across the border.  Marauding Janjaweed gunmen wielding whips and guns are sending villagers running for their lives. Nearly 60 percent of these innocents are children.

 
The atrocities committed in Darfur – throwing children into bonfires, spoiling wells with corpses, stealing all livestock, setting crops and homes ablaze – occasionally reach our front pages.

But the scope of these horrors is steadily growing.

Eastern Chad

In eastern Chad refugees fleeing across the border from Darfur arrive in a remote, desert region where resources, particularly water, are scarce.  Since early 2004 UNHCR has mounted a major logistics operation to move the vast majority of these refugees to camps at a safer distance from the volatile border. In some of the most desolate terrain on earth, UNHCR and its partners are virtually building small villages for thousands of people from the ground up -- everything from family shelters, clinics, schools, to latrines wells and other infrastructure.  In the face of danger, UNHCR will continue to provide basic life-saving assistance and monitor the fragile security situation along the border. 

Darfur

Across the border within strife-torn Darfur, Sudan, UNHCR is providing protection and community service activities for those internally displaced by the ongoing violence.  At least 2 million people have died.  Despite the dire security situation, UNHCR is providing live-saving assistance to thousands of victims, developing women and youth centers to address protection, social and legal issues.  For women, these centers will also address health needs and provide support to victims of sexual violence.  Activities also include income generation and education for children.  Your help will make the difference
between life and death.

Facing a fragile peace and a society torn apart by war, the UN Refugee Agency, (UNHCR) has much still to do in Afghanistan. The agency's main focus in 2009 is the voluntary return and reintegration of Afghan refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) back to their home country.  Since the end of 2001, more than 5 million Afghans have returned to their homeland. 

UNHCR's goal is to return all Afghan refugees voluntarily and safely. The agency is working to provide protection and assistance to returning families and develop sustainable solutions for their communities.

But the journey home is just the beginning. Once inside Afghanistan, families face the daunting prospect of having to rebuild not just their lives, but also their country's future.

Shelter and clean water are significant concerns for returning refugee families.

Since 2002, the UN Refugee Agency has provided shelters to some 170,000 families, benefiting more than one million people.

In addition, over the past five years, more than 9,000 water points were completed under UNHCR’s water program in high or potential return areas as well as those hit by drought, benefiting and estimated 1.4 million Afghans.

Many refugees are facing other reintegration difficulties, including a lack of land, and basic services such as health care and education. Job opportunities are also scarce. More than 28,000 returnees this year are living in five spontaneous settlements in eastern Afghanistan, unable to return to their place of origin due to insecurity, landlessness, tribal conflicts, personal enmity or lack of livelihood possibilities.

UNHCR is trying to conduct confidence-building measures to promote peaceful inter-ethnic co-existence, in order to establish an end to ethnically-targeted violence. Training workshops focused on promoting gender awareness are another essential aspect of UNHCR's protection of Afghan refugees.

USA for UNHCR calls on the entire international community to support humanitarian relief efforts in Afghanistan.  Help us rebuild refugee lives.