2018 in Review Trends at a Glance The global population of forcibly displaced increased by 2.3 million people in 2018. By the end of the year, almost 70.8 million individuals were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, or human rights violations. As a result, the world’s forcibly displaced population remained yet again at a record high. 70.8 MILLION FORCIBLY displaced Worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, or human rights violations at end-2018 25.9 million refugees 20.4 million refugees under UNHCR’s mandate 5.5 million Palestine refugees under UNRWA’s mandate 41.3 million internally displaced people 1 3.5 million asylum-seekers 13.6 Million newly displaced An estimated 13.6 million people were newly displaced due to conflict or persecution in 2018. This included 10.8 million individuals displaced2 within the borders of their own country and 2.8 million new refugees and new asylum-seekers. 16% Countries in developed regions hosted 16 per cent of refugees, while one third of the global refugee population (6.7 million people) were in the Least Developed Countries. 2 37,000 new displacements every day The number of new displacements was equivalent to an average of 37,000 people being forced to flee their homes every day in 2018. 3.5 4 5 in Nearly 4 out of every 5 refugees lived in countries neighbouring their countries of origin. 1 Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre of the Norwegian Refugee Council. 2 Ibid. 3 The number of new individual asylum applications for Turkey does not include Syrian nationals who receive protection under the Temporary Protection Regulation and relates to applications submitted to UNCHR until 10 September 2018, when the government assumed full responsibility for registration and refugee status determination. 4 This number includes both refugees and migrants from the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela worldwide as of February 2019. See: www.unhcr.org/5c6fb2d04 5 These figures refer only to refugees under UNHCR’s mandate. In addition, Lebanon hosted 475,100 and Jordan 2,242,600 Palestine refugees under the mandate of UNRWA. Million ASYLUM-SEEKERS By the end of 2018, about 3.5 million people were awaiting a decision on their application for asylum. unhcr > Global trends 2018