Nearly half of all refugees are children, and almost one in three children living outside their country of birth is a refugee. These numbers encompass children whose refugee status has been formally confirmed, as well as children in refugee-like situations.
Bantu refugee children from Somalia at a farewell party in Florida before being relocated to other places in the United States
A South Sudanese refugee girl in Rhino camp refugee settlement
Former child soldiers in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo
Ukrainian refugees fleeing the Russian invasion of Ukraine, 5 March 2022
A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a person who has lost the protection of their country of origin and who cannot or is unwilling to return there due to well-founded fear of persecution. Such a person may be called an asylum seeker until granted refugee status by the contracting state or the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) if they formally make a claim for asylum.
Konrad Schumann, an East German border guard, fleeing East Germany towards West Germany in 1962
Darfur refugee camp in Chad, 2005
Refugees from Herzegovina, painting by Uroš Predić in 1889 made in the aftermath of the Herzegovina Uprising (1875–77)
Turkish refugees from Edirne, 1913