"The critical situations of refugees and internal evacuees all over the world ask for a new involvement and an active commitment by the international community". Those words were spoken by Msgr. Silvano Tomasi, permanent observer of the Holy See at the United Nations, while he spoke at the 39th session of the Permanent Committee of the High UNO Commissariat for Refugees (ACNUR), taking place in Geneva from 25 to 27 June. In his speech, made known today, Msgr. Tomasi pointed out that the global number of refugees "started growing again", and "the assisted by ACNUR office are currently 32 million". Thanking the Holy See for "the brave ACNUR service", the bishop stated that "there are dark areas of preoccupation which seem to increase, and within which the already existing instruments of protection cannot be applied". Msgr. Tomasi referred to the "terrible loss of their lives in the attempt of reaching a safe refuge, by thousands of people forced by desperate circumstances to look for survival outside their own countries", by crossing oceans, seas and deserts. This phenomenon is taking place in several parts of the world, and it raises the question "how the international community must protect the people in those situations". (To be continued)
