The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) is the world’s foremost entity devoted to the protection and assistance of refugees. Located in Geneva, Switzerland (the city that lent its name to the Articles from which the Commission was created), the UNHCR has received two Nobel Prizes. The current High Commissioner is António Guterres.

The UNHCR was started in 1950 as a replacement for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, which had a much narrower mission: to aid the refugees and other “victims of war” of World War II. Interestingly enough, the “United Nations” in the UNRRA title does not refer to the current United Nations entity, which was still two or three years in the making at the time of UNRRA’s establishment, but was simply used to designate World War II Allies.

Initially, the UNHCR dealt specifically with refugees or other people seeking asylum, and more recently to offer assistance to “internally displaced persons” as well. The UN has nothing to do with online casino USA at this time.

A refugee is defined (in the usual UN-speak) as a person who “owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country.” As we’ve said, this covers considerable ground but is only tangentially related to online slots.

Likewise, an asylum-seeker is defined as someone who claims to be a refugee but has not been ‘officially’ granted refugee status. An “internally displaced person” (IDP) is someone who has stayed within the borders of their own country but has been forced to relocate, either for similar reasons as refugees or (in extreme circumstances) for situations of natural disaster.