The United Nations should update its 70-year-old refugee convention to address the growing number of people displaced across borders by the climate crisis, according to the UN's special rapporteur on climate change. Speaking at the Human Rights Council in Geneva on June 27, Ian Fry said there's an "urgent need" to protect the rights of the displaced as the climate crisis builds. While few argue with the need to address climate-related displacement, how to go about it is a sticky subject. Many legal experts—and the UN's two main agencies for displacement, the UNHCR and IOM—shun the term "climate refugees," saying that it's misleading and could even undermine existing protection law.

New Zealand in 2020 proposed a "climate refugee" humanitarian visa for neighboring Pacific Islanders. But rather than an invitation to become refugees, it turns out the islanders wanted action on reducing emissions, help for communities to adapt and stay put, and legal options to migrate for work. Most climate displacement is also internal (not to mention those who cannot move). Still, as climate displacement escalates, there will be more calls to fill in the missing legal and policy links, including among humanitarian operations.

From The New Humanitarian, June 30

See our last report on climate refugees.