Refugees Quotations

While starving refugees in Homs were providing target practice for government snipers, Bashar al-Assad's strongest international backer was in Sochi, at the Iceberg Skating Palace, visibly moved, smiling with deep satisfaction, as the Russians beautifully glided and leaped their way to the gold medal in the team event.

Americans are accustomed to welcoming, or at least receiving, refugees from other countries, not creating our own.

I was impressed by a program called New Roots, which helps women refugees from countries in conflict to start new lives in the U.S. by farming. They are trained in a four-year program, at the end of which New Roots helps them find their own land to farm and live on.

For years, Lebanese have known that Palestinian camps like Nahr al-Barid and Ain al-Helwe - hopeless slums crowded with generations of disenfranchised Palestinian refugees who can't go home because of Israel, and can't work because of Lebanese laws - are awash with gunmen, criminals and, since the war in Iraq, al-Qaida inspired jihadists.

After the Spanish Civil War against Franco, a group of us got together: a group of well-to-do people who were sympathetic to the lost cause of a Republican state. We bought a convent in Toulouse and converted it into a hospital run by the Unitarians. It took care of the Spanish refugees who fled to Toulouse.

We're all interconnected. For example, a simple lack of fresh water can lead to population dislocation, which can lead to political radicalization, which can lead to great pressure on the states that receive refugees because of a migrating population.

We open our door, and we are still committed to open our door for our brothers in Syria. But doesn't mean that we should not keep alone. The international community should really - should really share Lebanon the numbers of refugees and share Lebanon the cost of their living.

There is no more time for interim issues, ... Jerusalem has to be solved, and the refugees and the territorial has to be solved, if we are going to make a permanent peace.

We remain concerned that refugees in Macedonia are being forced onto planes and buses. This is unacceptable. We understand Macedonian concerns and will provide support to Macedonia, provided it complies with international rights and norms in its treatment of refugees.

We're going to need a larger KFOR, and we want it deployed to Macedonia as quickly as possible. Should there be a peace agreement quickly, as we hope, we need a force that's ready to go in and help the refugees get back as the Serb forces pull out.

WFP intends to continue helping the refugees but it can only do so with the help of the international community. That help is needed more than ever.

We feel that the refugees and victims have already gone through enough and to send a bunch of unorganized things just adds to their chaos and adds to their problems.

We want peace, but it must be a peace that makes Kosovo safe for the refugees to go home

(The) refugees have said time and time again that they will only go back if they see NATO in that peacekeeping force. They need to know that that force is built around that NATO core (and) that that force ... is not going to crumble like a pack of cards at the first sign of a challenge.

We used to have kids brought here through a church, refugees with life-and-death stories.

We are very far away from returning refugees to Kosovo or returning displaced people within the province to their original homes because, as we speak, people are still being expelled from Kosovo.

The protection of refugees in some parts of the world, especially in Latin America, is critically undermined by the lack of sufficient international visibility and financial support.

We cannot accept any peace that does not allow refugees to return and return safely,

She pledged that her government would work with UNHCR and other partners to reintegrate them into their communities, to identify employment opportunities, and to help them obtain those basic services that will enable them to resume a normal life. Her filmed message will be part of a UNHCR mass information campaign for some 190,000 Liberian refugees who are still scattered across West Africa.

None of us can honestly grasp the level of tragedy, but on an individual basis, we deal with refugees on a daily basis, ... This is a situation where one refugee camp may have difficulty helping another refugee camp.

Nobody came up with a plan for having this many refugees in our county. We are being asked to meet needs that nobody envisioned even a few days ago.

I am hopeful and really confident that we are at a turning point in our ability to bring North Korean refugees here.

I believe the most complicated issue is Jerusalem ... refugees -- not an easy one -- and as of now borders and settlements and a security regimen have not been fully solved,

I have interviewed the refugees and civilians from these villages who testified to this.

If it were to be true, it would be alarming indeed, because it is one thing to push refugees over borders where the international community is now increasingly ready to deal with them in a humane way, but it's quite another thing to push them back into a wasteland where there is no food, very little water, no medical supplies, where everything has been looted.

What is being done is fairly massive. There will be temporary field offices in various areas around the disaster zone, ... We'll be trying to get word to refugees that are staying in shelters that they can visit or call these temporary field offices to get their checks. As you can imagine, it's a rather difficult proposition to get that information out to the people who need it.

Having American refugees on American soil is heartbreaking, ... In Rhode Island and all across the country, American families are offering their homes, posting their offers on the Internet and on community bulletin boards. My wife Marisa and I offer our home for any family who is displaced.

Having American refugees on American soil is heartbreaking,

There are no reports of civilian casualties. The rebels assured us that civilians, refugees and aid workers would not be targeted.

Human Rights Watch should have, perhaps, directed it's concern to international institutions responsible for the protection of refugees in the countries, where they are settled.

guarantee the safe return of the refugees and the safety of all the people of Kosovo.

It is not just refugees but all the Afghan people who are in a precarious situation, a situation of great distress, which is intolerable.

It is hard to predict how many storm refugees will ultimately come to Texas, and how many will be kids, I think no one knows, I think it's safe to say longer than days. I think we're definitely into weeks and months possibilities.

Our staff on the ground reports that a trickle of refugees are crossing the Palk Strait to India in small fishing boats, fearing an escalation in the violence.

Our goal is not to relocate refugees permanently onto U.S. territory.

Refugees have come up from Louisiana and have located in Quitman County, Coahoma and Tunica,

Refugees attempting to build the blockhouse on the remains of the fort never mounted ... cannons although they may have had at least one with them.

Refugees are those people coming from foreign countries.

Some of the now older kids remember performing at the Convention Center in New Orleans, when they were the youngest ones on the trip. They've seen the recent television pictures of the refugees holed up at the Center, and the Aquarium (which they visited) that was destroyed by the hurricane. It's brought it all home for them and they've talked about it at some of our rehearsals.

My urgent message to all the refugees in the camps is, 'Don't come back yet, it's not safe,'

Like several hundred thousand fellow Karelians, we became refugees in our own country as great power politics caused the borders of Finland to be redrawn and left my home town as part of the Soviet Union.

We continue to hear from refugees ... a number of accounts of different kinds of crimes and atrocities, including recently that Serb forces are burning or destroying the bodies of their victims.

We estimate that we could see a further 50,000 refugees arriving.

We're already meeting with families utilizing our shelter (in West Jackson Baptist Church) and in the immediate area, getting the preliminary casework needed and pairing their needs to the proper agencies, and we'll be doing that throughout the 11 counties we serve. We'll be in Brownsville Monday, where there are 100 refugees in various locations, and in Selmer Tuesday, where there are 40 more.

We were hoping that the Europeans would denounce Israeli atrocities against our people. Unfortunately, they have linked aid to the needy and refugees to political considerations.

We had convoys bringing refugees back to the Houston convention center, then taxis to take them home.

We need to allow for the return of refugees, to allow for the deployment of international troops to protect the refugees and the population of Kosovo,

We are particularly worried about the health of the refugee population, domestic violence and refugees resorting to illegal employment or even to prostitution, just to put enough food on the table, ... When food becomes scarce, refugees often turn to desperate measures to feed themselves and their families.

We are deeply concerned about the implications this announcement will have for Rwandan refugees who have begun crossing the border again in recent days to avoid renewed fighting in western Rwanda.

We are concerned that the drive to keep the number of asylum seekers as low as possible may be resulting in some genuine refugees being denied the protection they need.

We plan to keep the site up whether we get a mass of refugees or not. It still can be a resource for people coming into the state who want to know what kind of housing is available.

We are happy that the governments have offered us a total of 85,000 places for refugees from Macedonia. The bottleneck, however, is the number of people who are actually being flown out. More people need to be flown out of Macedonia.

We, of course, want to help only those who are refugees and in need of help. We don't want to be an agency that helps rebels who go out at night and fight.

We're trying to galvanize European nations to take as many refugees as possible.

There are just too many unknowns right now. They're moving refugees to Texas. There hasn't been a lot of focus on people who are living in hotels and there are presumably 1.5 million people affected in Mississippi and Alabama. There is no one analyzing what the market impacts are going to be because we've never been in a situation like this before.

Finland has been a great supporter in the disarmament campaign. You have a remarkably low number of refugees and the number of cases of violence against women in Finland is extremely high for a European country.

While the war in Iraq was raging, I spent some time in neighbouring Jordan, meeting with Iraqi refugees who fled their country to try to find some place of safety. I interviewed many families about what had happened to them and what they did as a result.

We'll have to take Kosovo from virtually nothing to practically everything in the next few years, and that entails entire administration, the rebuilding, bringing the refugees back.

We all saw the evacuation of Houston during the hurricane. In the exodus from Paris, five million people hit the road in fear of the impending battle. After the French surrendered without a defense of Paris, many moved back. For me, the drama was that evacuation. I could not get the image of two people on bicycles in that flood of refugees out of my head.

We will be in a position relatively soon to welcome North Korean refugees in the United States.

We've prevented Milosevic from using refugees as a weapon to destabilize neighboring countries.

We're very disappointed to see that the United States Coast Guard has chosen to use firearms against refugees coming from Cuba. These are people who are desperate, and they're coming here not so much for a better life, but to leave behind a nightmare that exists in Cuba from the government of Castro.

We do not think there is an issue of refugees between China and North Korea

Every state except Massachusetts was represented. As baby boom demographics have converged with equity refugees and low interest rates, Sun Belt communities have benefited.

At this point, they (FEMA) don't have plans to move refugees anywhere other than where they are at this time.

At the end of last week we learned that the government of Syria has agreed to receive the group of 181 Palestinian refugees stranded at the Iraq-Jordanian border. We have not been informed that other Palestinians will be allowed into Syria.

Confusion: You cannot speak of your achievements for you are conceited, yet you cannot speak of wrongs because you complain. We encourage you to learn, yet if you teach what you learnt you are not qualified. You may be ridiculed for never taking chances in life, but if you do you must be careful. You are allowed to smoke whilst complaining about pollution. We must protect refugees fleeing war, yet we are scorned for protecting them in their homeland.

Angelina is living proof of the power we all have every one of us to make a difference. I was deeply moved by her descriptions of individual refugees struggling to live with dignity and hope, and found her personal commitment to be an inspiration.

Angelina is living proof of the power we all have ù every one of us ù to make a difference. I was deeply moved by her descriptions of individual refugees struggling to live with dignity and hope, and found her personal commitment to be an inspiration.

Emergency supplies have been sent to the refugees including rice and noodles, and they will be treated by paramedics as needed.

The witnesses will tell you that the vast majority of refugees fled their homes because of the attacks by Serb forces and not because of NATO bombing.

The state of Texas is consolidating refugees to central locations because it will make it easier to care for them.

So now we've got refugees going in both directions in this increasingly volatile region.

After more than a quarter of a century of misrule, much still remains to be done to rebuild the country. Overall, the conditions are in place for refugees to return to their country in safety and dignity.

Stopping these attacks against women, children, the displaced and refugees and ensuring their protection is our number one priority.

And the High Commissioner for Refugees would say, 'Well, at the very minimum at the outset we should be prepared for a certain number of displaced persons or refugees. Let's have X blankets, X food.' On that basis they came up with this $37.4 million list.

This is certainly not our preferred course of action. We simply have no choice. Although we had a stable pipeline for refugees through to December this year, we have received no contributions from 2006.

This is an extremely serious situation as these refugees live in camps and settlements in remote areas of Zambia and rely entirely on WFP for their food supplies.

This first group is a hope for the future for all Sudanese refugees and displaced.

This is a matter of momentous importance not only to this child, to this community, but also literally to hundreds of thousands of refugees who seek admission in this country.

They seem now to have started rounding up refugees queuing to leave Kosovo and returning them by force.

A long and difficult settlement looms. For Houston or Baton Rouge, these are huge numbers of people for them. They are desperately poor, seriously depressed, lost individuals with nothing. They are going to be hard to absorb. It's an enormous burden for a city to take it on. After the shock and warmth and compassion wear off, these refugees are going to have to find a way to become new citizens in these new places.

There will be a new appeal and a new plan to cover (expenses for) the rest of the year, which will be quite large ... especially if the refugees stay in Albania and Macedonia,

They have the rights of refugees for a year. Our first priority is ... the refugees who have family members in the United States who want to take them in. Second, there may be Kosovar Albanian-Americans willing to take them in even if they're not family members.

Forcing refugees who are the victims of previous conflicts to flee again in the course of the current conflict, which is not of their making, would result in great additional suffering for them.

That leaves us with a shortfall of $1.45 million. There are no signs that the refugees are intending to return home in the immediate future and it is crucial that donors respond to our request for funds to assist this population.

That leaves us with a shortfall of $1.45 million, ... There are no signs that the refugees are intending to return home in the immediate future and it is crucial that donors respond to our request for funds to assist this population.

The blood is still on the sidewalks, and already the government is blaming the Sudanese refugees and migrants. Given Egypt's terrible record of police brutality, an independent investigation is absolutely necessary to assess responsibility and punish those responsible.

It's important to provide this support regularly, because at this stage there are still about 200,000 people who are refugees or displaced people in their home country. It is a huge proportion of the population that depends largely on international aid.

New Zealand will be working closely with Australia and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees to arrange transshipment of the refugees to New Zealand,

They wanted someone there to talk to, someone who would listen to them. The other refugees - they had their own problems and didn't want to hear someone else's. Parents had to be strong for their kids. They would walk in with the weight of the world on their shoulders, and it made me feel good to do something.

It's really dedicated to the missing children of the Katrina refugees and all missing children. For me, that's a heart-rending thing.

At this stage it is not entirely clear who is responsible for this recruitment. But we can say that some of the refugees who were recruited have since returned to the camps.

In many ways, the flight of refugees from Kosovo is increasingly a flight from hunger.

In these next 12 months what we'd like to see is the steady start of the return to the south, a peace agreement to be achieved in Darfur and the east, progressive improvement of security in Darfur and the start of the sustained return of refugees there,

In fact, some refugees have even reported that Kosovar Albanians have been forced to dig these mass graves and put the bodies in.

Clearly, we want the refugees to be able to go back quickly. Those NATO governments who have agreed to receive those refugees have made it clear that this is on a temporary basis.

Chad has been very generous in accepting the refugees and working with us ... We certainly hope that good cooperation will continue.

The U.N. had such lofty goals to eliminate poverty and stop war and cure diseases and help refugees - things that no one country could do.

All those that were arrested after the election have been released and we have asked all refugees to come back so that we can talk together,