Factors ranging from conflict and poverty to climate change and extremism have driven a surge in mass migration. The plights of violent and impoverished regions have found the doorsteps of some of the world’s wealthiest countries. A lack of resources and inability to address systemic problems have led to calls for innovation. Collaborations between multilateral institutions, corporations, NGOs, social entrepreneurs, and refugees themselves have emerged to address camp conditions, education, and economic opportunity. Learn about approaches on the frontlines of refugee response and support.
Fleur Bakker is the driving force behind the Refugee Company and social enterprise A Beautiful Mess. Fleur is social entrepreneur, pioneer and co-creator driven by a clear vision on social justice. For more than 19 years Fleur has been working on programs and concepts aimed at improving the perspectives of refugees in the Netherlands and abroad.
I am from Myanmar and belongs to Rohingya ethnic group. I am leading Burmese rohingya organisation uk and for 10 years . I spoke for Rohingya issue in US congress UN human rights council European Parliament and others.
Policy Lead, Rights in Crisis (humanitarian campaigning), Oxfam International
Sarnata Reynolds is an international human rights lawyer and an expert on refugee and migrants' rights, statelessness and the right to nationality, and the rights of displaced persons during humanitarian crises. She is the Policy Lead for humanitarian campaigning at Oxfam International, and previously led Amnesty International’s advocacy on negotiations for the UN High-Level Meeting on Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants in New York.
Between 2011 and 2016, Sarnata served as both the Senior Advisor on Human Rights and the Program Manager for Statelessness at Refugees International, where she was responsible for leading the organization's analysis of international humanitarian responses from a human rights perspective. Sarnata led field research and produced reports on humanitarian needs and human rights concerns in Bangladesh, El Salvador, Israel, Kuwait, Lebanon, Malaysia, Mexico, Myanmar, South Sudan, and Turkey, among other countries.
Sarnata spent the previous four years as Amnesty International USA's Director for Refugee and Migrants' Rights, serving as a lead researcher on two groundbreaking reports, and spearheading AIUSA's policy and advocacy strategies in these areas. Earlier in her career, Sarnata defended refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants in deportations proceedings before the US immigration and federal courts.
Sarnata is a frequent author and her publications include Persecucion, politica y protección en Estados Unidos: encontrando un refugio frente al crimen organizado en las América (Persecution, politics and protection in the United States: finding a shelter against organized crime in the Americas) (December 2015), and the iBook, Who Is Dayani Cristal: An Examination of Modern-Day Migration (May 2014). She has testififed before the US Congress on many occasions and been a guest on PBS NewsHour, NPR News, CNN International, ABC News, Univision, and NPR's Latino USA, among other media outlets.
Emily Arnold-Fernández is the President and CEO of Asylum Access, the leading global refugee human rights organization. After learning that most refugees spend decades deprived of basic rights, Emily founded Asylum Access in 2005 to create a world where refugees can live safely, move freely, work and send children to school, and rebuild their lives.
Today, Asylum Access has impacted more than 2 million refugees worldwide, working intensively across multiple countries and at the global level to dismantle barriers to refugees' economic and civic participation and ensure all refugees have a fair chance at a new life.
Emily's achievements have earned her numerous accolades, including the Equality and Nondiscrimination Award from Mexico's National Council to Prevent Discrimination (2016); the prestigious Grinnell Prize (2013); and recognition by the Dalai Lama as one of 50 “Unsung Heroes of Compassion” (2009). She served as a Social Entrepreneur in Residence at Stanford University in Fall 2012 and on the Advisory Board of Oxford University's Refugee Studies Centre from 2014 to 2017.
Emily holds a Juris Doctorate from Georgetown University Law Center and a Bachelor of Arts cum laude from Pomona College. She lives on an island in San Francisco Bay with her spouse and three-legged dog.
