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The Conversation
The Conversation
Kelsey Norman, Fellow for the Middle East, Baker Institute for Public Policy, Rice University

Refugee numbers dropped in 2025 – but aid cuts and others trends suggest little to celebrate

Refugee UNHCR United Nations USAid
A man unloads humanitarian aid supplied by the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR at a school in Beirut used as a shelter for people displaced by Israeli airstrikes. AP Photo/Hassan Ammar

There was surprisingly good news when the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, released its latest report on June 10: The number of displaced people in the world fell in 2025 for the first time in a decade.

But there are some serious caveats. Many of the people who returned home in 2025 did so to countries such as Syria, still recovering from more than a decade of war, and Afghanistan, with its humanitarian emergency and repressive Taliban rule.

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