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Raise your hand if you've ever heard the phrase "Put yourself in someone else's shoes." It was one of the most common expressions my parents used when I was growing up as they tried to get me to look at a situation from a different point of view.

A lot of people do think if you could just put yourself in someone else's shoes for a moment, perhaps you would understand why life is not as easy as you seem to think.

But what about the lives of people in protracted refugee crises across the world? How simple is it for someone who has never been touched by this type of devastation and violence to actually imagine what life is like? Let's try.

Would you be able to imagine what life as a refugee would look like? Can you imagine the challenges and daily struggles you would face?

Perhaps I'm naive, but I don't think it is easy for everyone to comprehend the changes imposed on someone's life once they've become displaced. Luckily there are tools that can create a capacity to understand what another person is experiencing. Film has proven to be one of the most effective methods to create a sense of empathy and compassion.

Another powerful tool to help an audience understand a situation is to re-frame it in a familiar context. By shifting the debate away from refugee statistics and refocusing on the attitudes of those who may not be sure who refugees even are, one can create connections through common experiences and increase understanding.

The videos below all have one aim: to raise awareness for the refugee cause with a new perspective.

They will force you to imagine what the Syria Crisis would look like in New York City or London, to see what a year of conflict could do to a child, but most importantly to recognize refugees as ordinary people.

I guarantee you will see the current refugee crisis through a different lens after watching these videos. So unlace your shoes and go ahead and step into their world.

1. Most Shocking Second Day Video

This campaign was modeled off of the popular "one second per day" format, where people chronicle a year of their lives or their children's through one-second clips. You see her life transform over a year of conflict, with the ad concluding with the sentence, "Just because it isn't happening here doesn't mean it isn't happening."

The video, created by Save the Children and Don't Panic London, has nearly 50 million views. The collaboration reframes the Syria Crisis in a Western context and aims to remind people that the violence in Syria is still very real. Don't Panic said, "Our solution was to tell a story that would bring the realities of Syria home, and to do it we combined the one-second-a-day and photo time-lapse formats to create a new way of showing an ordinary girl's world falling apart in just a year."

2. What if Manhattan...

What if Manhattan were Syria? The Hamdi Foundation, a charity operating in conjunction with UNHCR, released a powerful video on regarding the plight of Syria's millions of refugees. It depicts New York City's usually bustling borough of Manhattan as a desolate, abandoned ruin - its crosswalk signals winking at no one, its subway cars empty of passengers.

"If the 1.5 million people living in Manhattan fled their homes," a caption in the video reads, "the world would notice."

3. Would you give your jacket to Johannes?

The Norwegian nonprofit SOS Children's Villages set up a candid-camera featuring a young boy, without a coat, freezing at a local bus stop. Most people stopped to help the young boy, offering their own coats and scarves, asking if he needed help and sitting with him to make sure he was safe.

The ad ends with the question "Are you a person who would act when you see someone who needs help?" and a plea to send aid to Syrian children.

4. So You Think You Can Stay Reality Show

So You Think You Can Stay is a parody of the worldwide well known TV show So You Think You Can Dance. The Norwegian Organization for Asylum Seekers (NOAS) wanted to raise awareness about asylum seekers that are often rejected for the same reasons as shown in the campaign. The contestants in the campaign are fictitious people, but their stories are based on real asylum cases taken on by NOAS.

"We want to show the stories of some of those who fled to Norway in our talent show. We will present people like Amir, who based on our experience, should be granted residence permit in Norway, but nevertheless has had his asylum application refused," says Mari Seilskjær, advisor in NOAS.

5. See refugees through new eyes

This haunting video was part of an innovative anti-xenophobia campaign which encourages Bulgarians to "see refugees through new eyes." The powerful slogan and ad attempts to make an emotional connection with the viewer and urges them to look at refugees through a different lens.

"The idea for this campaign, the most ambitious we have ever launched here, is to encourage people to see refugees for who they are - regular people who have fled horrific violence and persecution," says Roland-François Weil, UNHCR's representative in Bulgaria.

6. "Refugees are scum" Social Experiment

This social experiment that took place in Australia begins with a man wearing a sign that reads "refugees are scum." This incites angry reactions from locals and one pedestrian even rips the sign off of the demonstrator.

But what are the reactions from the public when he switches his placard to say: "Help the refugees?" Watch the video to find out.

The video was created to launch Act for Peace's fundraising appeal for the Ration Challenge. You can learn more about the Ration Challenge and Act for Peace here.

7. Clouds Over Sidra: A Virtual Reality Experience

This one will require a little more effort on your part, but it's definitely the most powerful video on this list.

Clouds over Sidra is an immersive experience that was created for the United Nations using the Samsung Gear Virtual Reality 360-degree platform. In this 8 minute groundbreaking film, a young Syrian refugee girl takes you on a virtual reality journey through the Za'atari camp in Jordan.

To get the full experience you'll have to download the app VRSE for your smartphone in addition to viewing it through a VR viewer, for example like the 10$ cardboard one Google has designed. The video goes outside delivering traditional facts and provides the viewers with a unique journey to understanding what life is like in a refugee camp.

"The idea is to help generate empathy toward the 3.5 million Syrian refugees living outside Syria," producer Socrates Kakoulides said.
These videos are just some of the numerous campaigns trying to spread awareness for the refugee cause. Did we miss any of your favorites? Tell us in the comments below.
If you'd like to repost this article on your website, please see our reposting policy.

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7 videos guaranteed to change the way you see refugees - UNHCR Innovation

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Raise your hand if you've ever heard the phrase "Put yourself in someone else's shoes." It was one of the most common expressions my parents used when I was growing up as they tried to get me to look at a situation from a different point of view.

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JUST RIGHT

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Newsela | Issue Overview: Political asylum

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Individuals seeking political asylum face persecution from both sides

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Syrian children in Lebanon find music school away from home

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Syrian children in Lebanon find music school away from home

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Newsela | Syrian children in Lebanon find music school away from home

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Special music school teaches young refugees traditional music.

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Newsela | Doors open and close for Syrians in growing refugee camp

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Newsela | The refugee who ran at the Olympics: "You can change the world"

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Olympic runner Yiech Pur Biel is a refugee from South Sudan who is helping bring a better life to children in refugee camps.

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Newsela | Refugee-staffed coffee shop in Calif. counters immigration backlash

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Nonprofit coffee shop in California staffed entirely by refugees, asylum seekers and illegal immigrants.

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Newsela | Refugee camps housing Rohingya rely on solar power for relief

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Rohingya refugee crisis includes limited access to electricity.

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JUST RIGHT/STRETCH

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Leaders from the private sector, human rights and refugee protection discuss big ideas for improving the global response to refugees on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos.

A Congolese man holds his child after he crossed the border from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) into western Uganda on January 24, 2018. SUMY SADURNI/AFP/Getty Images

DAVOS, Switzerland - On the sidelines of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos, we asked business, policy and humanitarian leaders to weigh in on their boldest idea for creating a better world for refugees in 2018. Here are a selection of their answers.

Filippo Grandi, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees

We need to move from a concept of relief to a model of inclusion so that refugees can go to school, utilize national health services and have access to jobs in the countries where they are, with a corresponding injection of resources by the international community into those countries. This is really the dream of the Global Compact. I think that if we were able to succeed with this model in a few countries, it would catch on. Because it's a win-win for everybody, including for host countries that are often impoverished. We're not there yet, with a few exceptions. That's what I would really like to see happen.

Neal Keny Guyer, CEO, Mercy Corps

My boldest idea would be to create a peaceful world so all the refugees could go home. Obviously that's a little Polly Anna-ish, but on the other hand, since conflict is the number one driver of refugees, if we, as a global community, can't find better ways to address the root causes of conflict and create environments where over 66 million displaced people can go home, then we are just tinkering at the margins in a very fragile world. First and foremost, this starts with a shared vision. One of the great divides today are between those who embrace shared society - where we see our common humanity first and then, the things that divide us second - as opposed to those who seem to embrace the notion of segregated society. We need to join forces with those who embrace shared society, creating education systems so that young people are exposed to those ideas.

Gemma Mortensen, Cofounder, More in Common

From the research that we've done, we think that the way in which you frame talking about refugees and immigrants can make a massive difference to the level of public support you can win for policies that are supportive of immigrant and refugee populations. The big thing will be to show that it's possible to take an act of great humanity [by accepting refugees], but also that integration can work - and not only in countries like Germany and Sweden that have taken huge numbers of people. We desperately need additional proof cases to show not just that it's the right thing to do, but that it's viable and a good thing for societies to do. Until that is proven, I don't think that we will know how to deal with the world becoming increasingly more mobile in the coming years.

Tara Nathan, Executive Vice President of Public-Private Partnerships, MasterCard

We have a tendency to think of big ideas as new innovations. But the truth is, most of these innovations already exist. Sometimes the biggest innovation is not about creating something new, but applying something that already exists in a new way. How can we leverage what the private sector already does today? Every single conversation I enter, I see exactly one issue that prevents progress, and that there's no clear articulation of the demand side, of the business requirements. The NGO or community or implementers either don't have the ability to fully articulate what they need, or are unwilling to, or maybe it's a little bit of both. On the private sector side, we also struggle [in] finding a way to engage in order to have high impact with low touch engagement.

How can we come up with partnerships - not just focused on thought leadership - but on an executional and operational level? The Smart Communities Coalition [launched in Davos] is meant to be an operational executional coalition. Now we have a group of people who say: "We get it. How do we take it further?" Ideas like pre-negotiation - to negotiate on behalf of large companies who have no interest in answering RFPs [requests for proposals]. How can we find a mechanism to create operational capacity, and to flexibly integrate and engage, so we extract value from the private sector and revitalize the humanitarian and development space?

Sara Pantuliano, Managing Director, Overseas Development Institute

My boldest idea for creating a better world for refugees in 2018 is to shift our thinking of technology and the ability to have a smartphone from being a luxury to instead a survival tool. People use it to track the best routes, border checks, and security controls, but also for job opportunities, translation apps, and educational or learning mechanisms. Once they're settled into a place, smartphones can help them stay in touch with people back home and send money. It's actually one of the most important things for them; we've seen people trading food rations in camps in order to buy airtime. We need to reconsider how critical a need technology is for refugees.
These answers have been edited for length and clarity.

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Expert Views: Bold Ideas for Creating a Better World for Refugees

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Leaders from the private sector, human rights and refugee protection discuss big ideas for improving the global response to refugees on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos.

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STRETCH

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ast week, 120 detainees at Yarl's Wood immigration removal centre began an indefinite hunger strike in protest at the conditions of their detention. The following day, on the BBC's Question Time, I challenged the Conservative party chairman and former immigration minister, Brandon Lewis, on his government's record of detaining vulnerable people.

Lewis has taken a prominent stand on the dissemination of false information, supporting a Downing Street initiative to tackle "fake news" and announcing, with more than a little fanfare, a Tory "respect pledge" to clean up political debate. So it was alarming to hear him deny basic facts when I challenged him on his government's record of detaining vulnerable people. He stated: "We do not have refugees in detention centres ... The people in detention centres are people who are illegally in this country, and are there for a period of time until they [go] back to their home country." When I pointed out that the Home Office does indeed detain asylum seekers while their cases are being processed - at the end of 2017, 59% of all adult immigration detainees were asylum detainees - Lewis answered: "Asylum seekers are not refugees."

The distinction Lewis tried to impose between people detained in centres such as Yarl's Wood and refugees is utterly misleading. Until they have their refugee status confirmed by the government, potential refugees are classed as asylum seekers while their applications are being processed. The idea that everyone who ends up detained in a centre will be sent back to their home country is patently wrong.

The government's own data shows that the majority of people in immigration detention are not subsequently removed from the UK. When I approached the MP for Tottenham, north London, David Lammy, for comment, he excoriated Lewis for giving this impression. Lammy said: "It is wrong for the government to claim that only illegal immigrants are detained in immigration detention centres when more than half of those detained in detention centres for months or even years are released back into the community. Many of those detained have done nothing wrong, and there are individuals with leave to remain, pending cases, and even EEA nationals in detention."

This week I spoke to a detainee on hunger strike who would prefer to remain nameless. She is from Zimbabwe, and had been living and working in the UK for over a decade before being detained at Yarl's Wood a few weeks ago. Some of her fellow detainees had been locked up for over a year. Describing the conditions, she said: "We are proper prisoners here." Men from the Yarl's Wood family unit (who have also joined the hunger strike) face particularly restrictive measures; they are unable to move freely within the confines of the complex without being accompanied by two Sercoworkers.

Lewis's comments on Question Time expose the moral stain at the heart of the 'hostile environment' immigration strategy

Shortly before we spoke, the hunger strikers had assembled in front of the facility's health centre to protest against inadequate care. I was told that, when treating people with physical and mental health difficulties, the G4S medical staff running the centre were "operating as an extension of the Home Office", asking invasive questions about immigration status during medical consultations. As a result, detainees were intensely mistrustful of the quality of treatment available.

Conditions in Yarl's Wood have been described by an independent watchdog as "difficult" and "disturbing": a detainee from Kenya reported having lost 10kg because of untreated stomach problems. In 2015, there was an average of more than one suicide attempt every day by detainees in immigration removal centres across the UK. The latest research suggests survivors of sexual and gender-based violence are routinely being detained at Yarl's Wood. This flies in the face of the government's own "adults at risk" policy, which states that vulnerable people likely to be retraumatised by the experience of detention should not be locked up.

Such policy breaches are the result of the institutionalised dehumanisation of migrants in our political culture. Lewis's insistence on using the term "illegal" rather than "undocumented" immigrants on Question Time deeply wounded the detainee I talked to. She spoke of her bewilderment at being demonised as "illegal" when she had spent years in this country paying tax and contributing to the economy, all while having no recourse to public funds. "We are not thieves," she said. "We are not criminals. In my 16 years in this country, I have never had anything to do with the police. We are not just statistics - we are human beings."

It is up to us to push for a transformation in political culture in which the basic human dignity of migrants is unequivocally respected. And perhaps that change is coming. Last week the shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, and the shadow attorney general, Shami Chakrabarti, were given rare access to Yarl's Wood, and met detainees. Abbott said: "These women were clearly desperate. Indefinite detention, with no release date, is just wrong." Lammy told me: "As the son of immigrants I proudly stand in solidarity with the Yarl's Wood hunger strikers." Abbott last year vowed to end indefinite immigration intention. This is a political opportunity to end the incarceration of vulnerable people, and the criminalisation of migration overall.

Lewis's comments on Question Time were not just factually wrong: they expose the moral stain at the heart of this government's "hostile environment" immigration strategy. We are not splitting hairs over whom we detain, or how they are processed. We are deciding who we are as a country - and judging ourselves by the measure of how we treat the most vulnerable among us.

Ash Sarkar is a senior editor at Novara Media

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By demeaning refugees, Tories have caused the Yarl's Wood hunger strike | Ash Sarkar

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ast week, 120 detainees at Yarl's Wood immigration removal centre began an indefinite hunger strike in protest at the conditions of their detention. The following day, on the BBC's Question Time, I challenged the Conservative party chairman and former immigration minister, Brandon Lewis, on his government's record of detaining vulnerable people.

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Inside Malaysia’s ‘Living Hell’ for Refugee Children

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Inside Malaysia’s ‘Living Hell’ for Refugee Children

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STRETCH

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Malaysia shelters thousands of mostly Rohingya refugees, recently joined by Syrians fleeing war. Yet the country offers few protections for refugees, and children bear the brunt of restrictions on education and work and the perpetual fear of arrest.

Five Rohingya children have their afternoon lunch on a large plate at Human Aid, Malaysia, 2017.Jueun Choi

- As he stepped out of Kuala Lumpur International Airport seven years ago, Mohammed* remembers feeling an overwhelming sense of calm.

It was an unfamiliar feeling for the 12-year-old from Aleppo. When the Syrian revolution broke out in 2011, his father feared the protests would reach their city and moved the family to Damascus. But the neighborhood where they rented a house soon came under attack, and in July 2012, Mohammed's family decided to flee the country.

Unlike most Syrians, they didn't go to neighboring Turkey, Lebanon or Jordan. In Aleppo, Mohammed had Malaysian neighbors who had since returned home and invited the family to join them. Malaysia is one of the few countries that allow Syrians to obtain a visa upon arrival. The family was able to fly to Kuala Lumpur, register as refugees with the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, and embark on a new life. Mohammed hoped for a good job for his father, a nice house like they had in Syria and to continue his education.

His hopes were short-lived. In a country with few protections for refugees, Mohammed was soon faced with a life of exhausting work shifts and run-ins with the authorities.

While Malaysia is not a country often associated with sheltering refugees, there are some 152,400 living there, while estimates of the unregistered refugee population range from 40,000 to more than 100,000. The vast majority come from Myanmar, including 66,000 Rohingya refugees, followed by Pakistanis, Yemenis and, more recently, Syrians. In 2015, Malaysia pledged to take in 3,000 Syrian refugees over three years.

Their status in the country is complicated by the fact that Malaysia has not signed the 1951 U.N. Refugee Convention and has no national refugee law or policy. Whether refugees are registered with UNHCR or not, they cannot work (beyond a small pilot scheme for Rohingya refugees) or send their children to government schools. The wait to register as a refugee can take years. The large number of refugees coming from Myanmar has made the process sluggish, with 56,300 asylum claims pending at the end of 2016.

"Based on my experience, I don't think [and] I will never think that Malaysia is a good choice for refugees."

Once registered, refugees receive a card from UNHCR that provides them with some benefits. While registered and unregistered refugees are equally liable for arrest or deportation under Malaysian law, showing the UNHCR card to police or immigration officers can sometimes provide some protection, depending on the whims of the officers.

Refugees often work in the informal sector, where they face exploitation, including extremely low wages and long working hours, and sometimes, no wages at all, according to the UNHCR office in Malaysia.

Malaysia is a "living hell" for refugees, said Ronald Sutedja, a counselor for the Malaysian Social Research Institute, a refugee support group. "Based on my experience, I don't think [and] I will never think that Malaysia is a good choice for refugees."

Out of School, Into Work

Children like Mohammed are the collateral damage of such policies. UNHCR supports a "parallel school system" mostly run by faith-based and charitable groups. But they often don't provide certification, and few refugees are able to continue to secondary schools. UNHCR estimates that only around 30 percent of refugee children of school age in Malaysia actually go to school.

When he arrived in Malaysia, Mohammed signed up at an NGO-run school in the state of Selangor, mostly for refugees from the Middle East. He loved getting to know the other Arabic-speaking refugees, but soon became frustrated by the quality of the education and worried it would be of little use without certification. "Teachers are not coming every day, and kids go just to have fun, not to study," he said. Then Mohammed's father fell ill and had to stop working. After a few months, he dropped out of school.

Mohammed, still just 12 years old, and his older brother went to work to support their family. Mohammed took a job washing dishes at a restaurant in the International Islamic University Malaysia, earning 20 Malaysian ringgit (about $5) per day for 12-hour shifts. When he went to a nearby mosque to pray, he would often doze off and have to be woken up by his boss. Yet Mohammed was a fast learner, and was promoted to be a cook and later a cashier.

While there are few statistics on child labor in Malaysia, refugee advocates say it is widespread and a major barrier to refugee education. With their parents unemployed or earning low wages, children are under pressure to work in malls, construction sites and restaurants, says Tawk Lian Sang, a volunteer refugee teacher at a Kuala Lumpur school educating Chin refugees from Myanmar.

Those who do stay in school face many challenges, including doing homework in cramped accommodation. Many of Sang's students live in apartments shared by four or five families with tiny rooms and shared living facilities, and find it impossible to find space and quiet to study.

Some students face bullying, like 14-year-old Iraqi refugee Ahmed*, who loves his Iraqi community school. However, he often comes home from school disheartened because Chinese and Malaysian students called him a terrorist or accused him of creating problems in Malaysia. "I like Malaysia, but some Malaysians are not good to me," he said.

"They really study hard and they're smart students. But because of the lack of opportunity, they can't get all this [success]."

In the under-resourced parallel school system, often teachers cannot speak the languages of their students. If older students don't speak English, they have to join elementary classes with much younger children and quickly become demotivated, says Arshad M. Khokhar, principal of the Light of the World Refugee School, which has around 100 primary and secondary students. Yet Khokhar emphasizes that his refugee students are eager to learn; so much so that they complain when the school observes public holidays.

Refugee children are often even more motivated than Malaysians to excel in their studies and make a success of their lives, says Kenny Ng Suet Choon, counselor at Malaysian Social Research Institute. "They really study hard and they're smart students. But because of the lack of opportunity, they can't get all this [success]," he said.

Risk of Arrest

The fear of arrest by the authorities plagues the lives of refugee families, making both work and education a risk. At Khokhar's school, 13 students and two teachers were arrested on their way home from class for not having UNHCR cards a few years ago. The school pleaded with police for their release and obtained a letter from UNHCR to prevent further arrests, but parents remain terrified for their children's safety.

Mohammed was arrested at the restaurant in 2014. He was held in a crowded jail cell for nine days before he was released. "Until now, I still feel like I'm in a jail," he said. He went back to washing dishes, but he missed his studies and just "holding books," he said. A couple of years later, when he was 16 years old, Mohammed met a Malaysian doctor at a refugee clinic who offered to sponsor his education at a private school. He jumped at the opportunity.

Now 18 years old, Mohammed is studying for a U.K. secondary school qualification. After school, he volunteers to teach English and Malay to refugees, and organizes campaigns and fundraisers to help asylum seekers in need. Last November, he set up a network of volunteers to provide workshops and programs to help refugee children better integrate into life in Malaysia. He dreams of becoming a teacher one day.

"I need to study because I still have that dream to rebuild my country," he said. "For me, education is my gun. With education, I can fight and I can destroy the war."
* Name changed for safety reasons.

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Inside Malaysia's 'Living Hell' for Refugee Children

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Malaysia shelters thousands of mostly Rohingya refugees, recently joined by Syrians fleeing war. Yet the country offers few protections for refugees, and children bear the brunt of restrictions on education and work and the perpetual fear of arrest. - As he stepped out of Kuala Lumpur International Airport seven years ago, Mohammed* remembers feeling an overwhelming sense of calm.

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Colombia’s Futile Deportations of Venezuelans

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Colombia’s Futile Deportations of Venezuelans

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JUST RIGHT/STRETCH

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With crisis-stricken Venezuela spilling refugees into Colombia and Brazil, politically expedient deportations make the situation worse. Aid groups are calling for international help.

Venezuelan citizens cross the Simon Bolivar international bridge from San Antonio del Tachira in Venezuela to Norte de Santander province of Colombia earlier this month. GEORGE CASTELLANOS/AFP/Getty Images

CUCUTA, Colombia - One evening in early February, local police rounded up Ernesto Marquez along with hundreds of his fellow Venezuelans in the Colombian border city of Cucuta, drove them to the frontier and ushered them back into the crumbling country they had previously fled.

The pushbacks by Cucuta law enforcement are part of a new policy response to long-simmering tensions between local residents and the Venezuelan migrants, who sleep by their hundreds in public places, which have begun to boil over violently.

Marquez, a 38-year-old chef, said Venezuela was too dangerous to sleep outside, so he stayed awake all night. In the morning, he walked back into Cucuta, alongside many of those deported the day before.

"We were loaded like dogs, like any other load of freight," said Marquez. Once a chef at the Princesa Plaza, an upscale hotel in the Venezuelan city of Maracay, he now sells individual cigarettes to save money for a bus ride to Colombia's capital, Bogota.

Marquez's quick return underscores the difficulties the Colombian government has had controlling the influx of Venezuelans, impoverished by hyperinflation and a sinking economy. Migración Colombia reported in February that more than 600,000 Venezuelans have entered the country through official crossings. Estimates of the number of irregular entries differ but may be as many of the legal entrants.

"The deportations don't do anything," said Father David Perez of the Catholic diocese of Cucuta, who runs a charity kitchen for Venezuelans at the border. "They send the migrants out and they return through the smuggling paths."

"The deportations don't do anything," said Father David Perez of the Catholic Diocese of Cucuta, who runs a charity kitchen for Venezuelans at the border. "They send the migrants out and they return through the smuggling paths."

The border between Colombia and Venezuela stretches over hundreds of miles through jungle territory controlled by a myriad of armed groups who oversee the hundreds of informal pathways for smuggling Colombian drugs and Venezuelan contraband as well as people. Experts doubt Colombia could impose effective immigration controls in such a lawless zone.

"The borders are unstable at the moment due to both the humanitarian situation and to the number of criminal and violent actors," said Ivan Briscoe, Bogota-based Latin America director with the International Crisis Group. "I do not think that Colombia has either the resources or experience to be able to manage a large outflow of migrants on its own."

Suggesting a heightened sense of urgency on the government's part, Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos visited Cucuta on February 9 to announce new actions addressing the refugee crisis. Santos suspended registry for Colombian border entry cards and deployed 3,000 military and police personnel to boost border security, noting that Colombia was spending millions of dollars to support the migrants.

"Colombia has never lived through a situation like what we have today," Santos said in a televised address before reporters and local authorities gathered to receive him in Cucuta.

The same day, Brazil's defense minister, visiting his own country's Venezuelan border, echoed Santos' remarks, deploying the military to the border and ordering the relocation of tens of thousands of migrants from the border zone. On February 12, Brazil's president, Michel Temer, visited the border city of Boa Vista, where a growing number of Venezuelan refugees are straining local resources.

"Obviously it's a reflection of the huge concern in these countries," said Briscoe with the Crisis Group. "It's a complex humanitarian emergency. International support is crucial."

Beyond the immediate humanitarian concerns, Colombia faces long-term threats of destabilization as masses of Venezuelans move into the country without proper reception, healthcare or social services, Briscoe said.

Both Colombia and Brazil will hold presidential elections this year, and neither incumbent will contest them. Temer has said he will not stand, and Santos is limping to the end of a second term, so there is little incentive for a long-term thought-through response to the Venezuelan refugee surge.

"I do not think that Colombia has either the resources or experience to be able to manage a large outflow of migrants on its own."

Santos' measures stopped short of extending more aid to the hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans now stranded in Colombia, or the countless more who are still sure to arrive, according to Ana Teresa Ramos, founder of Asociacion Deredez, which helps displaced people at the border with support from the U.N. Refugee Agency.

"It's good that he came, but he didn't do anything to help the Venezuelans," she said of Santos' announcements.

She said Colombia should work to provide documentation for the Venezuelans so that they can travel onward in the country, find legal work and enroll their children in school. And she said Colombia will have to provide those services at no cost, as few Venezuelans are able to pay.

Despite the urgency conveyed by Santos and Temer's visits, it is unclear that Venezuela's neighbors will be able to stem the flow of people over the border. Colombia's control of its border zone has weakened in recent years. Coca cultivation in the department surrounding Cucuta increased sharply between 2015 and 2016, from 28,482 acres (11,527 hectares) to 61,358 acres (24,831 hectares), according to U.N. figures, a sign of the growing presence of groups that run the drug trade.

Lawlessness in Venezuela has provided an opportune point of export for Colombian drugs, according to the International Crisis Group, and many illicit goods that would have left Colombia through Panama or the Caribbean coast now cross the border in the opposite direction of the migrants.

Armed groups now operate across the border with impunity - an important sign of weak state control. Such is the case with the ELN, an armed group that local magazine SEMANA reported in February were waging attacks in Colombia from bases in Venezuela.

People regularly turn up dead on the illicit roads and footpaths that traverse the area. Ramos of Asociacion Deredez said that any tightening of official border control will only push desperate Venezuelans onto illicit routes, by which they'll continue to arrive en masse in Colombia.

"All we can hope for is help from the other countries," she said.

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Porous Colombia's Futile Deportations of Venezuelans

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With crisis-stricken Venezuela spilling refugees into Colombia and Brazil, politically expedient deportations make the situation worse. Aid groups are calling for international help. CUCUTA, Colombia - One evening in early February, local police rounded up Ernesto Marquez along with hundreds of his fellow Venezuelans in the Colombian border city of Cucuta, drove them to the frontier and ushered them back into the crumbling country they had previously fled.

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Most refugees live in countries with scant mental health resources, despite a growing body of research on how displacement impacts mental health. In this edition of our 'Experts to Watch' series, we look at some of the leading thinkers and practitioners in this field.

A mental health clinic treating South Sudanese refugees in Bidi Bidi refugee camp in Uganda. Gael Cloarec/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Many of the world's 22.5 million refugees have lived through unimaginable traumas, including the persecution that caused them to flee their country and the often dangerous journey to a place of relative safety.

Yet the mental health needs of refugees go far beyond recovery from traumatic events. Recent studies show that how refugees are treated once they arrive in a new country - including whether they are detained, or have access to work, study and stable services - compound the impact of past traumas on their mental health.

Even so, around 84 percent of refugees live in low- and middle-income countries, where there is often little mental healthcare for the local population, let alone new arrivals. While international and local organizations endeavor to fill the gaps, a lack of resources for mental health and the stigma associated with mental illness often stand in the way.

"The ineluctable reality is that most refugees with mental health problems will never receive appropriate services," conclude the authors of a recent study in World Psychiatry journal.

In the latest installment of our "Experts to Watch" series, we introduce nine experts whose work has broken new ground or provided fresh insights into mental health and displacement.

Nancy Baron

Nancy Baron is the founder of the Psycho-Social Services and Training Institute in Cairo (PSTIC). Having worked on mental health programs around the world for U.N. agencies and NGOs, she saw a need to focus on training refugees living in the chaos of an urban - rather than a camp - context in how to deliver psycho-social services, especially in the Middle East. She founded PSTIC in Cairo in 2009. The institute trains refugees in mental health and psycho-social support, and facilitates them to deliver services to their own communities in their own language and in accordance with their cultures and traditions.

Mohammad Abo-Hilal

Mohammad Abo-Hilal is a Syrian psychiatrist who fled to Jordan in 2011 after being arrested and tortured by the regime. With several Syrian psychologist colleagues in his new country, he founded Syria Bright Future, a nonprofit providing psychiatric and psycho-social services to refugees, as well as training community volunteers to give mental health support. In 2014, the organization expanded its work to Turkey, where they work on mental health programs inside Syria and for refugees.

Pieter Ventevogel

Psychiatrist and medical anthropologist Pieter Ventevogel is the U.N. refugee agency's (UNHCR) senior mental health officer. He previously worked on mental health projects in Afghanistan and Burundi, and consulted for UNHCR and the World Health Organization in Egypt, Jordan, Libya, Pakistan, Sudan and Syria. Ventevogel also spent five years as the editor of the journal Intervention, dedicated to mental health in areas of armed conflict. His recent research includes a study of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh that found high levels of mental-health disorders, including PTSD and depression.

James Gordon

James Gordon is the founder and director of the Center for Mind and Body Medicine. A clinical professor in the department of psychiatry and family medicine at the Georgetown School of Medicine, he has championed mind-body techniques, including meditation, yoga, self-expression, drawings, movement and small group support, to address trauma and depression. Since he founded the center in 1991, it has worked in Israel, Gaza and Kosovo and recently trained Syrian refugee community leaders in Amman, Jordan. Previously, Gordon was chairman of the White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy under Presidents Clinton and G.W. Bush. He is the author most recently of " Unstuck: Your Guide to the Seven-Stage Journey Out of Depression."

Lynne Jones

Lynne Jones is a writer, child psychiatrist and visiting scientist at the Harvard School of Public Health. Her 2017 memoir " Outside the Asylum: A Memoir of War, Disaster and Humanitarian Psychiatry" details her two decades working in international relief and mental health. Her previous book, " Then They Started Shooting: Growing Up in Wartime Bosnia," explores children's experiences of conflict. She recently co-created Migrant Child Storytelling, a website where migrant children tell their stories through words and images.

Derrick Silove

Professor Derrick Silove is director of the Psychiatry Research and Teaching Unit at the University of New South Wales, Australia. He has published extensively on mass trauma, including in East Timor and Vietnam, as well as refugee mental health. He helped develop the state's refugee mental health service, STARTTS, and has created a number of manuals for mental health professionals on transcultural psychiatry. Professor Silove was the co-chair of the International Committee for Refugees and Other Migrants at the World Federation for Mental Health.

Segane Musisi

Segane Musisi is an expert on mass trauma and mental health in Africa. He is professor of psychiatry at Makerere University in Uganda and editor-in-chief of the African Journal of Traumatic Stress, the first peer-reviewed journal on rehabilitation from trauma in Africa. His recent study of the mental health of South Sudanese refugees in Uganda found considerable needs, but few available services.

Renos K. Papadopoulos

Renos K. Papadopoulos is director of the Centre for Trauma, Asylum and Refugees at the University of Essex, U.K. A Jungian psychoanalyst, he has worked with refugees and torture survivors as a consultant to the U.N. and the IOM, among other organizations. He founded the master's and doctoral programs in refugee care at the University of Essex and London's Tavistock Clinic. Recently, he was given an award by the European Family Therapy Association for his "outstanding contribution to the field of family therapy and systemic practice." He lectures and offers specialist training internationally, and his writings have appeared in 15 languages.

Emily Holmes

Emily Holmes is a visiting professor in psychiatry at Oxford University, where she focuses on the effects of extreme stress and emotion on the brain. She founded the Experimental Psychopathy and Cognitive Therapies Group promoting experimental psychology techniques. She also leads a mental imagery lab developing innovative treatments for PTSD in refugee populations.

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9 Experts to Watch on Mental Health and Refugees

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Most refugees live in countries with scant mental health resources, despite a growing body of research on how displacement impacts mental health. In this edition of our 'Experts to Watch' series, we look at some of the leading thinkers and practitioners in this field.

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We collected the best stories on refugees from 2017, as selected by refugee and migration experts and the readers and editors of Refugees Deeply.

Rohingya refugees who entered Bangladesh by boat walk toward refugee camps after landing in the Bangladeshi district of Teknaf on November 7, 2017. DIBYANGSHU SARKAR/AFP/Getty Images

We asked refugee and migration experts to select their favorite stories on migration and refugees from the past year and explain why they are must-read material. Here is a selection of their choices, as well as some sent in by members of the Refugees Deeply community and our editors' own favorites. (Let us know what stories you think should also be included via via email, Twitter or Facebook.)

Behzad Yaghmaian
Professor of political economy at Ramapo College of New Jersey
" Europe's 'Migrant Hunter' " by Jérôme Tubiana in Foreign Affairs

"Europe's 'Migrant Hunter'" is an intriguing study of the E.U.'s cash for containment policy. It is a detailed chronicle of the E.U.'s use of militias and warlords as proxy border guards in the effort to control the migration of poor sub-Saharan Africans to Europe. Jérôme Tubiana's article exposes the E.U.'s role in enabling criminal actors and facilitating the conditions that would eventually result in migrant slave auctions and other grotesque rights violations in Libya. This is a sober indictment of E.U.'s migration policy.

Izza Leghtas
Senior advocate, Refugees International
" The Desperate Journey of a Trafficked Girl " by Ben Taub in The New Yorker

I chose this piece because of the extensive research it reflects and the geographic area that Taub covered in the piece. From Benin City to Sicily via Agadez and the Mediterranean Sea, I love that Taub covered the story along the journey of the main character in the piece and so many others. But the main reason this story has stayed with me is that it is so human. Too often, reporting on migration along the Central Mediterranean refers to people as masses, as numbers, and to follow one character and give the reader the time to get to know her is incredibly refreshing. When I read the piece, I had recently returned from Sicily where I was researching the Central Mediterranean migration route, so it is an issue I was already familiar with. But I was deeply moved by Taub's writing style and the level of care and detail it reflects. I hope we can see more reporting like this.

Peter Tinti
Independent journalist and co-author of "Migrant, Refugee, Smuggler, Savior"
" Road to Damascus: The Syrian Refugees Who Want To Go Home " by Sally Hayden and Ziad Ghandour in The Irish Times

This investigation offers rare glimpse into the trials and tribulations of those trying to return home. So much has be written about Syrian refugees trying to reach safety and the hardship they face once they have arrived in Europe. But Hayden and Ghandour offer insight into the agonizing choices that Syrians face in trying to go home. Beyond the decision to stay in Europe or go home, there are considerations such as how to return (which often includes seeking the services of smugglers) and how to survive once they reach Syria. As the war in Syria draws down, the question of whether it is safe for those who fled to return will be one of the most complex humanitarian, legal and moral issues facing the international community. This investigation, for me, is an essential first look into the challenges individuals and institutions are going to face in the coming years.

Guy Goodwin-Gill
Acting director of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law
" Exit West " by Mohsin Hamid, published by Hamish Hamilton

Just suppose there were no fences to cross, no walls, no deserts, no treacherous seas, no mine fields, but just doors... doors through which you could escape, doors appearing here and there, sometimes known, sometimes whispered about, sometimes hidden, sometimes guarded, yet always manageable. Doors which take you, you know not where, but away, to new beginnings, among new peoples, who are fearful of you at first, then turning to accommodate, understanding that the doors cannot be closed, that new ones will open, and finding that true courage, which is not to attack when afraid. This is "Exit West," the tale of Nadia and Saeed, their lives and loves rooted in the realities of displacement - loss and longing and the pain of leaving, hardship and deprivation, labor and struggle, resilience and hope, always hope. In his beautiful, elegant prose, Mohsin Hamid carries you into their world, a witness to future history, to the indomitability of the human spirit and those infinite resources of love and compassion which outreach the common brutality of many a politician and functionary. And still they wonder why people flee...

Daniel Howden
Senior editor, Refugees Deeply
" Can 'Laptop Humanitarians' Solve History's Largest Refugee Crisis? " by Elizabeth Stuart in Bright Magazine

Working on refugee stories in Greece it has been clear the 2015 crisis was a moment of awakening or political activation for tens of thousands of volunteers all over the world. Much of the coverage of this phenomenon has sought to make simple judgments about the efficacy of the wave of volunteerism - was it a good thing or a bad thing? What few stories have captured was the diversity of the "laptop humanitarians" and the unlikeliness of some of the connections made. Stuart's piece acknowledges the burnout and mistakes made, the life savings squandered or relationships ruined, as well as some of the more obsessive behavior. She also captures the small acts of keyboard heroism and documents them with primary sources, using social media screengrabs. I don't care much for the headline but the result is raw and fascinating copy.

Charlotte Alfred
Managing editor, Refugees Deeply
" The Ungrateful Refugee " by Dina Nayeri in The Guardian

This essay by writer Dina Nayeri beautifully skewers the "gratitude politics" around refugees in Western countries. Nayeri fled Iran as a child after her mother converted to Christianity. Her whole life, she was constantly reminded to be grateful. When they arrived in Oklahoma, Nayeri describes how the community demanded endless retelling of their escape story and celebrated their role in the family's rescue, but never asked about their life in Iran. Nayeri deliberates on the complexity of gratitude in her life - at times genuine and overwhelming, at others an oppressive mask that is the price of entry to a new society - to make a political point. Do refugees have to be grateful or successful to be accepted - an undercurrent of much discussion about refugees in the West - or is it true, as Nayeri writes, that "a person's life is never a bad investment"?

Lazara Marinkovic
Freelance journalist, documentary photographer
"Tightening of Borders Makes Women Invisible Along Balkan Refugee Route" by Preethi Nallu in Refugees Deeply

This story about the experience of women refugees was quite important for me, as a woman, as a journalist, as a person living in Serbia - because it shows what is often left invisible. Also, it is very hard to write about this, as it's very hard to overcome cultural taboos and other restrictions to even get the story and all the necessary information.

Kimberly Curtis
Correspondent, U.N. Dispatch
" The Trauma of Facing Deportation " by Rachel Aviv in The New Yorker

There have been several other stories written about Resignation Syndrome this year but Aviv pulls together the different parts of the issue - the plight of the children, the political debate in Sweden, the attempts by medical professionals to understand - in an engaging fashion that stays with you. Even though Resignation Syndrome is unique to Sweden, it still connects to political debates in other countries such as the future of Dreamers in the U.S. and family reunification in Europe. In the end, it is a story about what it means to belong, and who gets to decide.
Also picked by:
Marina Petrillo
Senior editor of Open Migration and an author, broadcaster and journalist.
Among many beautiful and important stories, there are some who may have been overlooked or were swept away by the urgent narration on the Mediterranean over the summer. The story Rachel Aviv wrote for The New Yorker made a lasting impression on me. She went looking for the refugee children in Sweden who lost consciousness after knowing their families would be deported - a psychic illness called "resignation syndrome."

Bob Bilheimer
Director, Worldwide Documentaries
" The Central Mediterranean: European Priorities, Libyan Realities " by Daniel Howden in Refugees Deeply

And " Deeply Talks: Fallout From E.U. Migration Obsession Rocks Libya "

This piece was one of the first, and remains one of the most comprehensive, to explore the nexus of governmental failure, migration mega-trends and human trafficking/migrant smuggling. This piece, in many ways, focused the attention of readers on a violation of fundamental human rights and shed light on the E.U.'s complicity in the emergence of slavery in Libya. This reporting also helped catapult Libya to the top of the list for many other outlets and we are still today seeing new articles about what's happening there - evidence that the 24-hour news cycle can, and needs to be, broken. The sad reality is that what's happening in Libya is also happening in many other places around the world, as human traffickers are unrelenting in finding ways to exploit vulnerable people such as migrants and refugees.
The explanations above have been lightly edited for length and clarity.

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We collected the best stories on refugees from 2017, as selected by refugee and migration experts and the readers and editors of Refugees Deeply. We asked refugee and migration experts to select their favorite stories on migration and refugees from the past year and explain why they are must-read material.

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Refugees in Indonesia Told to Assimilate

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Refugees in Indonesia Told to Assimilate

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As the route to Australia has shut, Indonesia is making a reluctant and contradictory switch from being a transit country. But refugees there often face a struggle to survive.

An inside view of Immigration Detention House in west Jakarta, Indonesia, on December 19, 2017; with 445 people from various countries, the majority from Nigeria, it was was over-capacity.Erric Permana/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Fatema Barbari tears up as she recounts how police forced her family and 50 other refugees to flee a makeshift camp outside the immigration detention center in Jakarta, Indonesia's sprawling capital.

"They ordered us to leave at night," Barbari, 39, said as she looked around at her husband and two children at a bus station in west Jakarta. "But we have nowhere to go."

Barbari's 12-year-old daughter, Zahra Jaffari, translates her words into English from Dari, one of the languages of her native Afghanistan. The Jaffaris are ethnic Hazaras from Afghanistan and have been living in Indonesia since 2015.

For the past two years, the family was receiving financial assistance for housing from one of the U.N. refugee agency's partners on the ground. But since this ended last week, they have been homeless.

"We really like being in Indonesia. We feel safe here," Barbari said. "But it's not safe to sleep on the street."

There are 9,000 refugees and 5,300 asylum seekers in Indonesia, according to UNHCR, and more than half are from Afghanistan. One-third of the total 14,300 are living independently without any assistance.

The Jakarta Immigration Detention Center has a maximum capacity of 120 but it currently houses a total of 224 asylum seekers and refugees. It is meant to hold only foreign nationals who have violated visa regulations or who are to be deported. But now worried families, like the Jaffaris, are trying to get in. They believe that the only way to be considered for a place to live with international or government assistance is to be processed at a detention center.

The UNHCR began informing refugees that resettlement to a third country is becoming less likely, and that they must try their best to assimilate into Indonesian society.

The confusion is understandable. As resettlement out of Indonesia to other countries, such as Australia, dwindles, refugees already in Indonesia are in an awkward limbo. The UNHCR began informing refugees that resettlement to a third country is becoming less likely, and that they must try their best to assimilate into Indonesian society. But Indonesian officials insist permanent residency is not an option. Indonesia views itself only as a transit country for refugees, not a final destination.

Barbari and her husband, Khadan Ali Jaffari, 50, and three of their four children - Murtaza Jaffari, 19, Mohammed Hussain, 10, and Zahra Jaffari, 12 - have all been sleeping outside under an awning to protect them from rain for nearly a week. Their eldest son, Mustafa Jaffari, 21, lives in Brisbane, Australia, having migrated there in 2013. But a change in Australia's humanitarian intake program in 2014 makes refugees in Indonesia ineligible for resettlement.

"We miss him so much. We just want to join him in Australia, but we've been told we will not be able to go there," Barbari said.

Indonesia is not a signatory to the U.N. Refugee Convention outlining the rights of refugees and asylum seekers. The best the country provides is the right to stay temporarily and register with the UNHCR until resettlement can be processed.

In 2017, Indonesia's president, Joko Widodo, signed a decree recognizing the status of asylum seekers and refugees, and the country will no longer label them as illegal immigrants.

The presidential decree also set forth a policy to allow for more local refugee shelters to be set up. But many, like the Jaffaris, are forced to sleep on the streets until they can be placed inside detention centers, hoping that accommodation will soon be made available.

"We miss him so much. We just want to join him in Australia, but we've been told we will not be able to go there," Barbari said.

Refugees vie for a spot in one of the 42 community housing facilities run by the International Organization for Migration (IOM). These shelters are seen as an alternative to refugee detention.

"With UNHCR telling most refugees that they may not be resettled, it has created panic in the community. People have started to think about what they should do next," said Mohammad Baquir, a 19-year-old Afghan refugee who runs a school for refugees in Jakarta.

"Some have gone to the detention center. They're outside waiting to get in. They think they will not able to survive here on their own over the next few years," Baquir added.

The Jaffaris would like to stay in Indonesia, closer to their son in Australia. Both of their youngest children were attending local schools and integrating well by learning bahasa Indonesia, the official language.

Access to education is very limited for refugee children, so the Jaffaris see themselves as lucky to have been given an opportunity. But the children no longer attend class because of the family's uncertain situation. There are 11 informal refugee schools in Indonesia. Baquir's HELP for Refugees in Jakarta is providing Indonesian language lessons to make assimilation easier.

"There's a huge need for education in the [refugee] community," Baquir said. "We are facing so many limitations. We are not allowed to get formal education. We are not allowed to work or involve ourselves in any kind of activity where we could earn income."

The UNHCR, along with its partner organizations, does provide financial assistance to 400 of the most vulnerable refugees, but limited funds mean many more who are in need are left out.

"In Indonesia, we feel like we can make a life here. But we don't have any money," Barbari said.

If asylum seekers and refugees are to assimilate into Indonesian society rather than being forced to return to their home countries, observers say Indonesia must find solutions.

"We have seen many refugees become quite vulnerable. Many have lost their home and they have nobody to help them," said Lars Stenger, advocacy and information officer at Jesuit Refugee Service Indonesia.

The UNHCR recognizes that most Afghan refugees come from minority groups. If they were to be sent back to Afghanistan they might suffer persecution and human rights violations. This means it would be too dangerous for the Jaffaris ever to return. Compared to regional neighbors Malaysia and Thailand, the relatively small number of refugees in Indonesia - and the president's attention on the issue - makes it a perfect place to look at ways to solve their predicament.

Indonesia's 260 million people make it the world's fourth most populous nation and its social safety net prioritizes the estimated 28 million Indonesians living below the poverty line, with education and housing a priority.

"Indonesia has all the ingredients to be a successful model of managing and supporting asylum seekers and refugees," Stenger said. "But in the long run, there has to be some access to livelihoods."

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Refugees in Indonesia Told to Assimilate but Not Settle

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As the route to Australia has shut, Indonesia is making a reluctant and contradictory switch from being a transit country. But refugees there often face a struggle to survive. Fatema Barbari tears up as she recounts how police forced her family and 50 other refugees to flee a makeshift camp outside the immigration detention center in Jakarta, Indonesia's sprawling capital.

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In our latest Deeply Talks, the Migration Policy Institute's Kathleen Newland and Refugees Deeply's Daniel Howden discuss some of the key issues they're watching in a critical year ahead for refugees and migration.

Men prepare to distribute food aid from the World Food Programme at a warehouse at Bokolmanyo refugee camp in the Somali region of Ethiopia on December 19, 2017. ZACHARIAS ABUBEKER/AFP/Getty Images

Recent efforts to overhaul the world's approach to refugees and migration will face some crucial tests in 2018.

Countries will negotiate two Global Compacts on Refugees and Migration by the U.N. summit in September. Several experiments to free refugees from aid dependency by enabling them to work desperately need to show results this year. Meanwhile, the pressure to send refugees home looks set to further test the principle that refugee returns should be voluntary.

In our latest Deeply Talks, Kathleen Newland, senior fellow and cofounder of the Migration Policy Institute, and Refugees Deeply senior editor Daniel Howden discussed some of the most promising ideas for reform, while offering a dose of reality over the economic and political obstacles that lie ahead.

On the Migration Compact, one practical way forward is mini-multilateralism - "building coalitions of interested parties, to take joint action on specific issues" - as Newland described in a recent piece for Refugees Deeply. These could range from uncontroversial areas such as expanding consular protection for migrants, to thornier issues such as sending migrants back to their countries.

Another idea for cooperation over migration is Global Skills Partnerships, in which countries cooperate to train potential migrants for the benefit of both their home and destination countries, as outlined in a recent article by economist Michael Clemens.

"It's a great example of win-win situation in migration," Newland said. "As with most proposals, the devil is in the details, as a lot depends on what the job market in the country of origin is like. Some countries complaining of brain drain of nurses provide such dreadful working conditions that they also have a lot of unemployed nurses because people just aren't willing to work for salaries or conditions on offer."

On the Refugee Compact, the initial or "zero" draft that was just released by the U.N. refugee agency, Newland said its model of integrating refugees into the workforce and education "is the only sustainable path for refugees in the long term."

"Keeping refugees idle, out of the labor market and out of education, is the greatest waste of human resources you can imagine," she said. Newland pointed to Turkey as a place to watch for its approach to refugee integration, while Refugees Deeply's Howden highlighted efforts to apply the "compact model" - aid and loans in exchange for opening the labor market to refugees - in Ethiopia.

Yet with around half of Ethiopia's refugee population under 18, investing in education will be just critical as building industrial parks, and shed light on whether "this is genuinely long-term thinking or a version of "you-host, I-pay,'" Howden noted.
Listen to the whole episode of Deeply Talks: Can 2018 Change the World for Refugees?

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Deeply Talks: What to Watch on Refugees and Migration in 2018

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In our latest Deeply Talks, the Migration Policy Institute's Kathleen Newland and Refugees Deeply's Daniel Howden discuss some of the key issues they're watching in a critical year ahead for refugees and migration. Recent efforts to overhaul the world's approach to refugees and migration will face some crucial tests in 2018.

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Rohingya Crisis in Myanmar: A Diplomat's View

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Students: Use codes to join classes, and then complete assignments.