UNHCR: 75 years on, the Refugee Convention Remains a Lifeline for Millions

Refugees fleeing violence in Ethiopia's Tigray region cross the Tekeze River into Sudan in November 2020. Credit: UNHCR/Hazim ElhagOpinion by Elizabeth Tan (geneva)Monday, July 27, 2026Inter Press Service GENEVA, July 27 (IPS) - Seventy-five years after the Refugee Convention was opened for signature on 28 July 1951, it remains the foundation of the international refugee protection system and one of the most consequential international legal instruments ever adopted. Born in the aftermath of the Second World War, it codified a simple but powerful principle: people forced to flee persecution, conflict or violence must be able to find safety and protection.No society is immune to war, persecution or sudden upheaval. The Convention was built on that universal truth: that people forced to flee must be protected.Over the past seven and a half decades, it has been a lifeline for people fleeing conflicts and persecution, from post-war Europe and wars of national liberation across Africa, to the Indochina wars and military dictatorships in Latin America, to more recent crises in Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and Sudan.A total of 149 States are parties to the Convention, its 1967 Protocol, or...