The number of forcibly displaced people across the globe has reached 123 million with ongoing conflicts in Lebanon, Sudan and elsewhere driving rising displacement, according to the UN refugee agency UNHCR.

The displacement figure is the highest in history and comes as humanitarian efforts face an unprecedented financial squeeze.

The UN’s High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi revealed the figure in a statement to a UN General Assembly committee, calling for “urgent international support”.

Mr Grandi described as “catastrophic”, humanitarian situation in Lebanon, where Israeli airstrikes have caused massive civilian casualties and infrastructure damage, including to schools, hospitals and roads. 

“The humanitarian consequences are overwhelming and require urgent international support,” he said, adding that 470,000 people have crossed into Syria in recent weeks. 

In Sudan, the situation has also reached critical levels, with more than 11 million people displaced since the conflict began 18 months ago. 

“Conditions in Sudan defy description – wanton violence, sexual atrocities, starvation, floods, disease. We are witnessing in real time the collapse of a nation’s social infrastructure,” Mr Grandi said.

He expressed particular concern about the increasing trend of governments implementing restrictive measures that focus on border controls and sometimes attempt to “outsource, externalise or suspend asylum.”

Mr Grandi said that such approaches were “not only ineffective but also breach their international legal obligations”. 

He called for a more comprehensive and effective approach to addressing displacement, urging countries to look beyond border control and consider “entire displacement routes”. 

Mr Grandi urged countries to “look for opportunities in countries of origin to strengthen the resilience of communities at risk of climate displacement”. 

He also encouraged UN member states to “look for opportunities to expand legal stay and regularisation programmes in countries of asylum or transit, creating access to services and to employment”.

The was also a need to establish more “pathways so people can move legally and safely”, he said.

Speaking to the humanitarian funding crisis, Mr Grandi revealed that UNHCR has had to axe 1,000 jobs and freeze critical life-saving activities due to recent financial constraints.

He said “funding levels for 2025 and beyond remain uncertain, further jeopardising our and host countries’ ability to respond to refugee and displacement crises in a predictable and flexible manner”. 

“Conflicts like the one in Lebanon, where the devastation is catastrophic, and where — like in Gaza — a desperately needed ceasefire does not materialize, and Israeli airstrikes continue,” Mr Grandi said.

“Resulting in huge loss of life. Civilian infrastructure — schools, hospitals, roads — destroyed. The humanitarian consequences are overwhelming and require urgent international support. And yet the appeals for Lebanon and Syria remain critically underfunded. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced.

“A vast majority of them Lebanese, but also many Syrians — as you know Lebanon has hosted Syrian refugees for more than a decade. People who fled a war and now find themselves having to flee another.

“In the weeks since the beginning of the conflict in Lebanon, 470,000 people — 30 per cent of them Lebanese and 70 per cent Syrians — have crossed into Syria. If they can even manage to cross, considering the roads leading to the borders have also been bombed,” Mr Grandi said.

“We must be able to act together even in difficult times,” he said, stressing the need for continued international solidarity with displaced and stateless people worldwide.

The displacement figure has risen by more than ten million in a year.

At the end of June 2023, 110 million people worldwide were forcibly displaced from their homes due to persecution, conflict, violence and human rights violations,

The global refugee population reached 36.4 million at mid-2023, an increase of 4 per cent, or 1.1 million, from the end of 2022, driven by increasing numbers of refugees from Afghanistan, Sudan, Syria and Ukraine.

The number has doubled in the past seven years.