Conflict drives growth in global refugee totals: thinktank

The number of refugees and internally-displaced people across the globe has risen from 33 million in 2013 to 43 million in 2014 and 46 million by mid-2015, the director of a strategic think-tank here said Thursday.

Dr John Chipman, chairman of the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS), told journalists at a press conference to launch the thinktank's annual "Armed Conflict Survey" that the armed conflict in Syria and also in Libya had driven the rise in the number of refugees.

One of the consequences of increased military pressure on the Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq has been a displacement effect, Chipman said, pointing to the group's growing foothold in Libya.

However, Libya was unlike Syria, and was less fertile ground for IS. "Its fighters there are seen as outsiders, and society lacks the sectarian divisions on which the jihadists have fed in Iraq and Syria," said Chipman.

Data from the "Armed Conflict Survey" also noted that in 2015, 167,000 people died in armed conflicts, with 33 percent (55,000) of these in Syria.

Conflicts in Mexico and Central America accounted for 21 percent of global fatalities, with a combined death toll in excess of 34,000. Meanwhile, fatalities fell sharply across sub-Saharan Africa, despite an increase in deaths in Nigeria's conflict with Boko Haram.

The largest year-on-year increase in fatalities was seen in Afghanistan, which registered 15,000 deaths as a direct result of the conflict.

However, the rate of increase in the number of deaths from armed conflict had slowed.

Chipman noted: "In the previous edition of the 'Armed Conflict Survey' we noted that since 2008 there had been a decrease in the number of armed conflicts but a steady increase in the number of fatalities. In 2015, the death toll halted its rapid ascent." Endit