Kazakhstan provides assistance to refugees and stateless persons

Geneva, 14-15 December 2021 – The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees held the first High-Level Officials Meeting to assess progress towards achieving the objectives of the Global Compact on Refugees, which was adopted in December 2018.

The main purpose of the event was to strengthen international cooperation in responding to refugee problems.

In his welcome speech, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees F.Grandi stressed the importance of this event in the implementation of the Global Compact on Refugees. He noted that in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and armed conflicts, the situation of refugees and internally displaced persons continued to deteriorate.

Representatives of 67 countries, including Kazakhstan, spoke during the event. Permanent Representative of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the United Nations and other international organizations in Geneva Zhanar Aitzhanova in her speech underlined measures implemented by Kazakhstan in support of refugees and stateless persons. In particular, it was noted that 139 refugees obtained a residence permit over the last two years, 4,969 stateless persons were granted identity documents within a campaign conducted jointly with UNHCR.

She emphasized that this year Kazakhstan has fulfilled the commitment made during the 2019 Global Refugee Forum to issue ICAO standard machine-readable travel documents for refugees.

At the end of the meeting, F.Grandi expressed gratitude to the Governments for the measures taken to achieve the goals of the Global Compact on Refugees. At the same time, he noted that the world community still has a lot of work to do.