MOSCOW (Sputnik) — During his two-day visit, the head of the UN Refugee Agency will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and other dignitaries, Grandi’s chief spokesman Ahmad Fawzi told Sputnik.
19 February 2017, 17:59 GMT
The spokesman said the high commissioner regarded Russia as an important global partner whose involvement in UN humanitarian effort would benefit refugees worldwide.
The UN estimates that a record 65.3 million people have been displaced, with 21.3 million forced to flee abroad as a result of conflict or persecution. A half of them come from Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia.
With 274,700 asylum claims, Russia, the main destination for thousands of eastern Ukrainians, topped the list of the world’s largest recipients of new individual applications in 2014, followed by Germany, the United States and Turkey.
