Grand Challenge Launch Address – ‘A Minor Miracle: The New Global Compact on Refugees’

Volker Türk, Assistant High Commissioner for Protection, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) will deliver the inaugural address for the Grand Challenge on Refugees and Migrants at UNSW Australia.

For the first time in 65 years, the UN General Assembly has adopted a declaration – the New York Declaration – which affirms and enhances the protection of refugees. This would be an important and unprecedented achievement at any time, but is particularly impressive given the xenophobic and anti-refugee rhetoric currently on display in many countries around the world. At a time when borders are being fortified to keep refugees out and when refugees are accused wrongly of being terrorists, it is nothing short of a miracle that States unanimously adopted a declaration that affirms and strengthens the protection of refugees. In addition, the UN has committed to create a new Global Compact on Refugees in 2018. Will this be a game-changer for the international refugee protection regime? And how will Australia need to respond?