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Refugees And Asylum Of Refugees

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Hundreds of thousands of people every year are forced to leave their homes. Refugees are defined as people who have to leave their homes in order to survive and be safe. Natural disasters and the folly of man cause masses of people to flee their native countries into neighboring territories to wait until it is safe to go back home or to relocate for good. A refugee refers to a person or people who, outside their country of origin, are unable to save themselves from their country or are unable to return there for fear of persecution (Jastram, 2001). What makes a refugee a refugee? Who deserves refugee status? A common misconception is that refugees and asylum seekers are the same things. The right to seek asylum was granted to people by the 1951 Geneva Convention. The 1967 Protocol expanded the notion of refugee displacement from just Europe to the rest of the world following World War II (Wettergren, 2014. 566). The terms are very different. An Asylum Seeker is defined as a person who has left their country and has applied for recognition as a refugee in another country but is still waiting for the decision on their application (Refugee 2011). When people are forced to leave their own countries and immigrant to another one, they are considered asylum seekers until their requests for refugee status has been accepted. After their application is accepted, they are officially recognized as a refugee. The right to determine whether or not a person is a refugee is not reserved

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