Expanding Lawful Pathways for Refugees

Since the 1951 Refugee Convention following the Holocaust, refugee resettlement remained nearly identical until Kabul fell to the Taliban in 2021. In that context, The UNHCR referred "the most vulnerable" refugees for resettlement into third countries. The US represented approximately 90% of those allocated spaces and accepted refugees from every corner of the globe, most especially from Sub-Saharan Africa over the last 15 years. 

However, the fall of Kabul to The Taliban pushed the US to make two dramatic innovations in refugee resettlement through one action. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention, and this is no different. 

The US (and allies) needed to get over 80,000 Afghans out of the Country within a matter of weeks. Definitionally, none of them would have refugee determination status, and so the US would not only need to pull them to immediate safety, but they'd also do so my utilizing a legal status called Humanitarian Parole (HP), not a traditional refugee status.

This is the first time in the modern era that we have both seen a specific population determined by the destination country and the utilization of parole in large quantities.

The World's ability to do this directly influenced the success with which they replicated something similar for Ukrainian National following February 24th 2022 when the US, Canada, the UK and the EU all opened their doors to Ukrainians. 

We believe that we're witnessing a major shift in resettlement where destination countries are selecting populations for strategic reasons in their own national interest AND that they're utilizing a range of legal stati to do so.