Displaced women and girls are at unprecedented risk of violence across the globe, according to a new report from the UN refugee agency UNHCR.

The report, timed to coincide with International Women’s Day, says of conflict-related sexual violence have surged by 50 per cent in recent years.

But funding shortfalls, in part driven by the Trump administration’s winding back of USAid, are forcing humanitarian organisations to cut essential services in crisis-affected regions.

Safe houses – once a refuge for survivors at risk of immediate attacks by traffickers, armed groups and other perpetrators – have been closed.

Legal aid programs, which once offered a path to justice, have been dismantled, allowing perpetrators of violence to act with impunity.

Ruven Menikdiwela, the UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Protection, said the plight of displaced women was heartbreaking.

“Women and girls fleeing war deserve to find safety. Yet across the world, they are now at even greater risk of rape and other forms of horrific violence. Without immediate funding, more safe houses will close, more survivors will be turned away, and more women and girls will face violence with no medical and psychosocial support. It’s heartbreaking and unacceptable,” Ms Menikdiwela said.

The lack of global humanitarian funding is having devastating consequences, the report says.

“In South Sudan, only 25 per cent of the dedicated spaces created by UNHCR for women and girls at risk of violence are currently operational, leaving up to 80,000 people without access to services such as emergency psychosocial support and legal and medical assistance,” it said.

“Programs to protect refugees – particularly adolescent girls – from child marriage and other forms of violence have also been suspended, putting over 2,000 of them at aggravated risk.

“In Ethiopia, more than 200,000 refugees and internally displaced persons no longer have access to life-saving services, including a safe house that used to host women in immediate danger of being killed.

“In Jordan, at least 63 programmes providing specialist support to women and girls are closing down or on hold, leaving 200,000 vulnerable people in both refugee and host communities without help,” the report said.

For many years, programs to prevent and respond to sexual and other forms of violence against refugee and stateless women and girls have saved lives, providing safety, legal assistance, medical care and psychosocial support – critical services for survivors escaping violence, the report said.

But despite its life-saving importance, support in this area has suffered from years of underinvestment and was only 38 per cent funded in 2024. 

Ms Menikdiwela said the current crisis in humanitarian funding risks pushing this vital work beyond the point of no return.

“On this International Women’s Day, we remind the world that displaced women and girls are not only survivors; they are leaders and changemakers. We must sustain and increase investment in their safety, education and economic empowerment to break these vicious cycles of violence and drive lasting change,” she said.