The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR) said that during the first six months of 2013, more then 46,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Yemen, a country that has received close to half a million refugees since 2006.

“UNHCR staff and our partners, such as the Yemeni Red Crescent and the Danish Refugee Council, work daily to record new arrivals and offer them support,” UNHCR spokesperson Melissa Fleming told reporters in Geneva. “That help takes many forms, including food and water, first aid and transportation to transit and reception centres, hot meals, welcome packages including blankets and clothing, accommodation and counselling.”

Fleming said UNHCR had witnessed a significant change in the refugee and migrant population arriving in Yemen over the past two years, with more arrivals from Ethiopia. Previously, Somali refugees made up between one-third and one-quarter of total arrivals. Other arrivals come from Djibouti and Sudan, she said.

“Refugees and migrants are vulnerable to exploitation, violence and sexual abuse at all stages of their journeys,” Fleming said. “Boats crossing the Arabian Sea or Red Sea to Yemen are often overcrowded. Smugglers may force passengers into the water to avoid detection. Smugglers and traffickers often wait on the coast to receive the new arrivals.”

The Government of Yemen automatically recognizes Somali arrivals as refugees, while UNHCR determines the refugee status of Ethiopians and other nationals. Fleming said few Ethiopians seek asylum as many want to travel beyond Yemen or do not know how the asylum process works.

“As a result, most Ethiopians are left extremely vulnerable,” she said.

Fleming said there have been positive developments, as the number of dead or missing refugees and migrants has dropped significantly – to five people so far this year from 43 in all of 2012. Yemeni authorities have also had some success in locating smugglers’ and traffickers’ bases and cracking down on their operations.

“We are also engaged with the Yemeni Government and national and international partners. Together we are working to enhance services offered to refugees, asylum-seekers and migrants as well as find sustainable solutions,” she added.

“Although population growth has slowed for the world as a whole, this report reminds us that some developing countries, especially in Africa, are still growing rapidly,” said the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, Wu Hongbo in a press release on the report.

The report, World Population Prospects: the 2012 Revision, notes that the population of developed regions will remain largely unchanged at around 1.3 billion from now until 2050. In contrast, the 49 least developed countries are projected to double in size from around 900 million people in 2013 to 1.8 billion in 2050.

Compared to previous assessments of world population trends, the new projected total population is higher, mainly due to new information obtained on fertility levels of certain countries. For example, in 15 high-fertility countries of sub-Saharan Africa, the estimated average number of children per woman has been adjusted upwards by more than 5 per cent.

“In some cases, the actual level of fertility appears to have risen in recent years; in other cases, the previous estimate was too low,” said the Director of the Population Division in the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs, John Wilmoth, during a press conference in New York.

“While there has been a rapid fall in the average number of children per woman in large developing countries such as China, India, Indonesia, Iran, Brazil and South Africa […] rapid growth is expected to continue over the next few decades in countries with high levels of fertility such as Nigeria, Niger, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia and Uganda but also Afghanistan and Timor-Leste, where there are more than five children per woman.”

Mr. Wilmoth added that changes in fertility rates over the next few decades could have major consequence for population size, structure and distribution in the long run.

The report notes that India is expected to become the world’s largest country, passing China around 2028, when both countries will have populations of 1.45 billion. After that, India’s population will continue to grow and China’s is expected to start decreasing. Meanwhile, Nigeria’s population is expected to surpass that of the United States before 2050.

Europe’s population is projected to decline by 14 per cent, the report states, and Mr. Wilmoth warned that the continent is already facing challenges in providing care and support for a rapidly aging population.

Overall, life expectancy is projected to increase in developed and developing countries in future years. At the global level, it is projected to reach 76 years in the period 2045-2050 and 82 years in 2095-2100. By the end of the century, people in developed countries could live on average around 89 years, compared to about 81 years in developing regions.

The report’s figures are based on a comprehensive review of available demographic data from 233 countries and areas around the world, including the 2010 round of population censuses.

“Water is central to the well-being of people and the planet,” Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in his video message for the International Year of Water Cooperation 2013. “We must work together to protect and carefully manage this fragile, finite resource.”

More than half of the world’s people depend daily on water resources shared by more than one country and 90 per cent of the global population live in countries that share river or lake basins. However, 60 per cent of the world’s 276 international river basins lack any type of cooperative management framework.

Ban stressed that with rising demands and changing climate conditions, it will be crucial for countries to work together to ensure every person has access to quality water.

“Each year brings new pressures on water,” Mr. Ban said. “One-third of the world’s people already live in countries with moderate to high water stress. Competition is growing between farmers and herders; industry and agriculture; town and country. Upstream and downstream, and across borders, we need to cooperate for the benefit of all – now and in the future.”

The General Assembly proclaimed 2013 International Year for Water Cooperation in 2010, following a proposal from Tajikistan. The Year will serve to raise awareness and prompt action on the multiple dimensions of water cooperation, such as sustainable and economic development, climate change and food security.

“Overexploitation, management, financing of water resources, all of these aspects are incredibly important and cooperation at different levels is therefore critical,” UNESCO Science Specialist Ana Persic said during a press conference to mark the start of the Year at UN Headquarters in New York.

Persic added that the benefits of intensifying cooperation include poverty reduction, equity, economic growth, and the protection of the environment. “We know water is critical for human life, but it is also critical for life on Earth if we want to protect and sustainably manage the planet we have.”

The UN representative of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Paul Egerton, underlined the link between climate change and water, stressing that extreme weather events result in desertification or extreme flooding in different areas and hinder development and access to safe water.

“Water scarcity triggers migration, refugees, situations where basic human rights are weakened or threatened,” Egerton said, adding that fewer resources can also trigger conflict and governments need to address these risks immediately.

The official launch of the Year took place today at the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) Headquarters in Paris, France. Opened by the agency’s Director-General Irina Bokova, the event gathered representatives from inter-governmental organizations, non-governmental organization (NGOs), scientists and policymakers from around the world to discuss themes such as existing mechanisms for water cooperation and regional, national and local cooperation around river basins.

As part of the launch, an exhibition entitled “Water at the heart of science” was inaugurated at UNESCO, and students from Japan travelled to meet their French counterparts to share their experiences related to water and prepare a youth declaration on water cooperation to be presented to the other participants.

Cooperation on water issues will also be the theme for World Water Day, observed on 22 March.

As long as the extraction of Mali uranium and other valuables from its soil by French and other western firms went unobstructed, nobody cared about what happens in the poverty-stricken country. Entire populations had been pushed to the desert by the loyal to Paris regime of the capital Bamako. It’s the economic interests stupid.

However when the Mali desert tribes found cheap weaponry after their children returned, home having served as missionaries the Gaddafi regime in Libya, thus becoming easy recruits for the Islamist rebels, the entire West rose to “save” the country from being split. It must be noted that the Islamists are the only organised force opposing the Bamako oppressive regime. No wonder then why the desert tribes follow and support them, being their only hope to have control of their soil.

The EU Parliament

Already from Wednesday 16 January the European Parliament in Plenary Session had issued a statement backing France’s initiative in Mali. The announcement goes like this:

“MEPs saluted France’s military engagement in Mali and urged EU member states to show real solidarity with Paris in Tuesday’s 15 January urgent debate with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. They also deplored the lack of a European response to the crisis in the region. France’s military intervention was welcomed by all Parliament’s political groups, which highlighted the exceptional circumstances created by the north Mali rebels’ offensive against the south. MEPs stressed that Mali must not fall into the hands of terrorists”.

This is absolute hypocrisy. For one thing there was no solidarity for Paris by all political groups. There is solidarity only by some western governments. London, Washington and Brussels have expressed their backing to the French intervention in Mali. Even Berlin has not yet expressed unquestionable support to Paris over the Mali issue.

It was only High Representative Catherine Ashton who expressed unconditional support to France. She even decided to spend €50 million of EU money for this support. The Council of Europe announcement goes like this:

“In the light of the recent developments in Mali, on 17 January 2017 (n.b. this is a typing mistake of the year 2013 to be credit on the haste of some people in the Council running in support of Paris) the EU’s Foreign Affairs Ministers decided to speed up the deployment of the military training mission in Mali (EUTM Mali).

The Council was united in condemning the aggression of terrorist groups and welcomed the quick response of France, supported by other EU member states”. Mind you the announcement doesn’t say unanimous, it says united, which means there was not unanimity. In any case the issue takes everyday new dimensions after the Algerian Islamist have intervened in favour of the Mali rebels.

It seems that unfortunately Islamism has become the last-ditch of defence for the impoverished millions of people in North Africa and the Middle East.

It was not always like that. The Arab version of secular socialism, of Nasserism in Egypt and Baathism in Iraq and Syria had totally transformed those societies into secular states. It is the same for Turkey’s Kemalist secular tradition and the neo Muslim direction of Tayyip Erdogan.

It seems however that after some years of western interventions and economic impoverishment of vast masses of people the entire region has become a waste land stricken by lack of basic necessities and internal split supported if not created by the western governments. Now the West must face the repercussion of its policies in North Africa and the Middle East.

By George Pepper, Europeansting.com (by permission)

By 2050 one in every three births will be African, compared to only one in ten in 1950, according to just one of the findings in UNICEF’s Generation 2025 and beyond: The critical importance of understanding demographic trends for children of the 21st century.

Almost one in three children under the age of 18 will also be African, the study says, though under-five deaths will continue to increasingly occur in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly in pockets of poverty and marginalization of heavily populated, low-income countries, and in least developed nations.

Overall, demographic shifts involving children will present policy makers and planners with “major challenges” in the decades following the 2015 deadline for achieving the anti-poverty goals known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which the international community set in 2000 to dramatically reduce poverty, UNICEF said in a press release.

Launched by the General Assembly in 1954, the Universal Children’s Day is aimed at having countries focus on the welfare of the world’s children as they promote the ideals of the UN Charter. The day also harks to when the Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989 – both on the date of 20 November.

The study found that the United States is the only high-income country projected to have an increasing proportion of children by 2025.

“What is important is whether the world, as it prepares for the post-2015 agenda, takes account of this fundamental and unprecedented shift,” said a co-author of the study, David Anthony of UNICEF. “We must do everything possible so these children get an equal chance to survive, develop and reach their full potential.”

Co-author Danzhen You of UNICEF highlighted the need to “safeguard” children in a way that their rights are “respected and upheld.” UNICEF said this was especially necessary as the aging global population increases pressure to shift resources away from children.

“Children do not vote,” You said. “Their voices are often not heard when governments make decisions about funding.”

The UNICEF study drew its findings from UN Population Division projections.

“Though China and India will continue to have a major share of the world’s population, in absolute terms, Nigeria will see the highest increase in its under-18 population of any country, adding 31 million children, a rise of 41 per cent, between 2010 and 2025,” the study says. “At the same time, Nigeria will account for one in every eight deaths among under-18s.”

According to projections, the 49 UN-designated Least Developed Countries (LDCs) will account for around 455 million of the two billion global births between 2010 and 2025. Five populous middle income countries – China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria – will account for about 859 million births between 2010 and 2025.

“For least developed countries, serious consideration must be given to how to meet the needs of children, especially in health and education,” UNICEF said.

The study notes that population growth is such that children will make up 90 per cent of the next billion people – expected by 2025 after the world’s population reached seven billion in October, 2011.

The paper’s recommendations include targeting investments to areas where children will be born; focusing on neglected groups, especially in high-population, middle-income countries; reaching the poorest and most isolated households; and urgently tackling the issue of old age dependency.

“Reproductive health and rights are integral to sustainable development and poverty reduction. Investing in universal access to reproductive health is a crucial investment in healthy societies and a more sustainable future,” he added.

Observed annually on 11 July since 1989, World Population Day focuses attention on the importance of population issues in the context of development plans and programmes, and the need to find solutions for these issues.

“The world’s population has more than tripled since the United Nations was created in 1945, and keeps growing,” Mr. Ban noted. “With more than seven billion people now inhabiting the planet, we face ever greater demands on shared resources and significant challenges to the achievement of internationally agreed development goals.”

The theme for this year’s Day is ‘Universal Access to Reproductive Health Services,’ aimed at highlighting the essential part that reproductive health plays in creating a just and equitable world.

“Working for the survival and the well-being of women and girls is a human right imperative. And in order to take advantage of women’s full potential in the development of their nations, they must be able to plan their lives and families,” the Executive Director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), Babatunde Osotimehin, said in his message for the Day. “This is why the international community is determined to making universal access to reproductive health a priority.”

According to UNFPA, reproductive health problems remain the leading cause of ill health and death for women of childbearing age worldwide. Some 222 million women who would like to avoid or delay pregnancy lack access to effective family planning, while nearly 800 women die every day in the process of giving life.

Osotimehin said helping meet the needs of those 222 million women would help prevent 21 million unplanned births, and help prevent 79,000 maternal deaths and 1.1 million infant deaths.

In addition, he said that about 1.8 billion young people are entering their reproductive years, often without the knowledge, skills and services they need to protect themselves – and their needs and human rights must be urgently addressed.

“We also have to address the special needs of young people – particularly adolescent girls. Today, pregnancy and childbirth-related complications are the major cause of death among girls 10 to 19 years old in most developing countries, while the highest rates of sexually transmitted infections are among young people aged 15 to 24,” the UNFPA chief said.

He added that family planning is a basic human right, but “it remains meaningless unless individuals and couples have access to contraceptives, information and services to enable them to exercise that right.”

Actions carried out as part of the special measure will be wide in scope and may include the delivery of basic and specialised education and health services, support to livelihoods, capacity building (such as training of NGOs and activists), support to the media, cultural activities and civil society.

High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy / Vice President of the Commission, Catherine Ashton, said: “While the international community must continue to support Kofi Annan’s plan and use all its influence to stop the violence and begin a transition, the European Union remains strongly committed to supporting the Syrian people in this time of suffering. We need to deliver all the support we can.”

EU Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy, Štefan Füle, commented: “From the very first day of civil unrest in Syria, the EU has stood by the people of Syria. Today’s decision will significantly strengthen a solid financial basis and a flexible tool for quick and effective support to help the Syrians most in need.”

With Syria entering the second year of civil unrest, life for the population has become ever more difficult, with no obvious solution in sight. Basic commodities are expensive and access to fundamental services such as education and health is becoming increasingly challenging. Everyday life has become unpredictable and isolated, systemic acts of violence have spread almost over the entire Syrian territory. According to an estimate of the United Nations (UN), this situation has until now led to approximately 1 million displaced people including, over 40,000 refugees.

With regard to this deteriorating situation, the EU remains committed to continuing and increasing its support to the Syrian population in every way possible.

The special measure amounts to a total of EUR 23 million. Given the circumstances and the operational constraints on the ground, the focus will be put on projects implemented by partners with a solid track record in the country and in the region. This will complement the 10 million euros funding of humanitarian projects already undertaken by the European Commission in Syria and in the countries hosting Syrian refugees.

In Syria itself, EUR 12.6 million will be made immediately available to assist the Syrian people in coping with the unrest and its consequences and preparing for a transition. Selected projects of varying sizes will address the short and medium-term needs and will enhance the role of Syrian civil society in transition.

A flexible response tool will be set-up to allow quick, responsive and targeted support to projects implemented by local or international NGOs and organisations; in fields ranging from support to livelihood and the delivery of basis and specialised health services to capacity building and cultural activities.

In Lebanon, the overall objective of the special measure is to mitigate the impact of the influx of Syrian refugees. More precisely, a EUR 5 million action will seek to support the medium and longer term needs of both the local Lebanese population and of Syrian refugees in the main host communities in Lebanon. To this aim, the EU will continue its close co-operation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Essential needs in the field of primary and secondary education for both Syrian refugees and the Lebanese host communities in the North and the Bekaa valley will be addressed and educational support provided to some 3,000 Syrian and 1,000 vulnerable Lebanese children.

In addition, Syrian refugees and host populations will be supported through community empowerment (such as awareness raising activities). Targeted support will aim to strengthen Lebanese authorities at central level (High Relief Commission), at local level (municipalities, and to the Ministry of Social Affairs through its Social Development Centres) and local NGOs.

In Jordan, the planned activities with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), for a total of €5.4 million, will contribute to ensuring safe and appropriate services for Syrians living in Jordan, by providing up to 15,000 vulnerable Syrian children in host communities with access to free formal education for the current and next school years, and other relevant education and psychosocial support services. 2,000 children and adolescents excluded from the formal education system will have access to alternative learning activities at the community level.

All actions in this 2012 special measure will be implemented in complementarity and close coordination with EU humanitarian assistance, linking relief, rehabilitation and development, and avoiding any overlap with humanitarian assistance or with other donors’ contributions addressing other urgent priorities.

“The figures of the Report and the result of the opinion poll support the Commission’s view that the European Union needs a strong and coherent migration policy, responding both to short term and long term needs. We need to effectively manage our external borders, to safeguard free movement within the EU, to provide genuine protection to those in need whilst at the same time providing channels for legal migration and mobility”, said Cecilia Malmström, Commissioner for Home Affairs.

According to the Report:

- There are some 20.2 million third-country nationals in the EU, around 4% of the total EU population (502.5 million) and 9.4% of the estimated 214 million migrants worldwide.

- In 2011, some 343 000 persons were refused entry to the EU, a decrease of 13% from 2010. Also in 2011, some 468 500 persons were apprehended (a decrease from 2010 when it was about 505 000) and Member States returned around 190 000 third-country nationals (15% less than in 2010).

- In 2010, the average employment rate of third-country nationals aged 20-64 was 58.5%, compared to 68.6% of the total population aged 20-64.

- In 2011 EU Member States recorded just over 302 000 asylum applications, a significant increase of 16.2% compared to 2010. This remains however far below the peak of 425 000 applications received in 2001.

- Some 12.7 million Schengen visas were issued in 2011, the majority in the Russian Federation (40.7%), followed by the Ukraine (8.7%), China (8.1%) and Turkey (4.7%).

According to the Eurobarometer:

- 68% of the poll thinks that legal immigrants should have the same rights as their own national citizens. Four in ten Europeans (42%) think the EU should encourage labour migration from non EU countries to help tackle demographic challenges and labour shortages, with 46% disagreeing.

- Eight Europeans in ten (80%) think that the EU should increase its assistance to Member States to handle irregular migration. 78% think that the cost of handling irregular migration should be shared among EU Member States.

- 53% of the poll thinks that immigration enriches EU countries economically and culturally. 60% of the Europeans believe immigrants may face integration difficulties because of discrimination.

- 80% of the poll thinks that EU Member States should offer protection and asylum to those in need. Eight Europeans in ten think that the number of asylum seekers should be more equally shared among EU Member States.

- Just fewer than six in ten respondents (57%) agree that it should be easier for non EU citizens to travel to the EU for tourism or business. The possibility to travel within the EU without internal border controls is important for 67% of the respondents.