 Good morning, good afternoon and good evening to all participants. Now we're starting the day two or the first IDM session in 2022. And I would like to give the floor to I am Deputy Director General Ugochi Danos. Ugochi, floor is yours. Thank you very much, Dejan. Good morning, good afternoon, distinguished guests, panelists, participants, colleagues. And welcome very much to this second day of the IDM, which is centered on facilitating regular migration. And as part of this, the panel today focuses on legal identity as an as an enabler of regular migration and access to rights. And to other human rights does not depend on the possession of a registered identity by a competent authority since all human rights are inherent to all people. Indeed, any individual exists before the law by his or her near existence. Article six of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and legal identity conferred by a state is declarative. Yet, proof of legal identity, including proof of nationality, is a requirement for crossing international borders and internal checkpoints in a regular manner. An adequate documentation is key to participate in admission and state processes to obtain a visa or permit, access family reunification, and for safe and dignified return and reintegration. Over the next few minutes, our distinguished panelists will share some insights on how states and key stakeholders, such as IOM and our UN partners, can strengthen regular pathways and admission and state processes by working towards universal access to legal identity. As practices such as the ones we will learn about today are crucial to guide the road ahead for implementation of the global compact on migration and likewise ensure that mobility during and after COVID-19 is accessible to all. IOM is very pleased to be part of the UN Legal Identity Task Force, a group of 13 UN agencies delivering on the commitment of the 2030 agenda to provide legal identity for all, a key enabler of rights and protection for people on the move. This work is also linked to the recently launched UN Common Agenda, which underpins identity for all as a central tenant to accessing justice. Lastly, before passing the floor to our distinguished panelists, allow me to take a moment to share some related to IOM's work to support universal access to legal identity. Our first ever forthcoming institutional strategy on legal identity aims to tackle several challenges related to people on the move and access to documentation and will be launched imminently. Through this strategy, IOM will step up its efforts to deliver non-discriminatory access to legal identity documentation through adequate and rights compliant systems for all migrants, irrespective of their legal status. IOM's approach includes a strong focus on gender and protection, noting that migrants in vulnerable situations and often women and girls may face greater challenges when it comes to accessing registration and identity documents. Legal identity holds the key for safe and regular migration. So while the right to a legal identity is universally recognized, estimates suggest approximately 1.1 billion people lack access to documented legal identity across the globe. These include migrants, IDPs, refugees and returnings. As enabler of sustainable development, which directly intersects with regular migration, universal access to legal identity is a cross cutting issue for migrant management and for the fulfillment of several commitments under the global compact for migration. These include robust protection schemes for migrants, reducing vulnerabilities, accessing rights and services, and safe and dignified return and reintegration for migrants. However, people on the move in particular often face unsurmountable challenges when trying to obtain proof of legal identity. Accessible and non-discriminatory civil registration systems for all are the first step to ensure migrants have access to proof of nationality and documentation. However, many states still lack robust and inclusive civil registration systems or the capacity to use adequate identity and travel documents linking these to national identity management systems and common databases. As well as consular services to register life events and issue documentation for nationals abroad while safeguarding the right to privacy and protection of personal data. Further strengthening these capacities in countries of origin and through consular representations abroad, as well as stronger cooperation between states on this, remains some of the most important challenges to the provision of adequate documentation to all migrants, regardless of their status. Today, we will learn about successful approaches and practices to effectively tackle the legal identity gap and, in turn, protect the rights and well-being of migrants. While functioning civil and consular registration systems, including the capacity to register life events and issue official records abroad, are fundamental to issue proof of legal identity for all and therefore crucial for safe migration. Migrants with proof of legal identity are less likely to resort to irregular channels, which expose them to a number of dangers, including smuggling and trafficking networks, amongst others, enhancing vulnerabilities and entrenching existing inequalities. So I'm extremely excited that we have three outstanding speakers with us today who will present good practices as well as challenges. Now, first and foremost, I'm very pleased that we will have Jaime Vasquez-Brachel, Director General for Consular Services at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mexico, who will focus on matricula consular ID card, Mexico's new consular ID card aiming to improve the secure and reliable identification for Mexicans abroad. We will also have, we're also joined by Christoph Thomas, Senior Advisor, Ministry of Justice for Migration Sweden, who will contribute Sweden's perspective and best practices in achieving objective four of the Global Compact on Migration, which is ensure that all migrants have proof of legal identity and adequate documentation. And last but not least, Neal McCann, Policy Advisor and Project Manager on Legal Identity, who will bring UNDP's perspective looking at the common agenda goals and its work to support legal identity for all and how to leverage partnerships through the UN Legal Identity Task Force and how to improve registration systems, including civil registries and access to documentation systems to ensure they are rights compliant to address the legal identity commitments found in the SDGs and the GCN. So welcome again, distinguished panelists. I'll start with Mr. Vasquez-Brachel. Thank you for, again, thank you for joining us. In your capacity as the Director General of Consular Services, you've been coordinating migration, economic security and health issues in close collaboration with the Consular Network of Mexico and the United States. So with great pleasure, I'd like to invite you to present Mexico's experience in the implementation of the GCN objective four to establish proof of legal identity as a policy priority. What key operational and technical capacities are useful for countries seeking to improve access to civil registry systems and issuance of identity documents, in particular, regarding information and communication technology solutions with robust data protection measures. And lastly, what best practices exist to better equip consular representatives abroad to provide legal identity related support to migrants, including birth registration and issuance of records for vital events, whether some of the recent efforts undertaken regarding capacity development and the exchange of best practices. Mr. Brachel, you have the floor. Well, thank you very much, Deputy Director General. I'm very, very pleased and very honored to be part of this panel. First of all, I'd like to say that I coordinate not only the issuing of documents in the United States but in all our consular network abroad that consists of 148 offices distributed in 80 countries. And this, of course, includes the issuing of Mexican passport, but also our consular ID or matricula consular, which is what we're going to speak about today. But before that, I would like to express my gratitude and recognize IOM's strategy in advocating for legal identity and the framework of the global compact for migration and UN's sustainable development goals. We believe IOM's efforts to advocate for legal identity as an enabler of human rights through technical workshops that include board of management, development of technical capacities and consular assistance, strengthen this strategy to promote human rights. And today, as I said, I'd like to share Mexico's experience in issuing our matricula consular or consular ID and hopefully share some of our best practices to contribute to this UN's objectives. So first of all, as we all know, recognizing legal identity of people regardless of their migratory status is fundamental for enabling their access to human rights. This is especially important for a country like Mexico that has more than 30 million people living abroad, mainly in the United States. As we all know as well, the lack of legal identity is a factor that promotes exclusion and discrimination of people. So it is vital that people have documents that are able to ensure who they are and allow them to identify themselves before authorities or private entities. So Mexico legal identity is ensured in Article IV of our constitution and we also have a law that protects the right of girls, boys and infants and adolescents in having legal identity. And I'll walk you very briefly through Mexico's experience and consular IDs. Our consular network dates to 1824 with our first consulate in New Orleans since we had this ship route from Veracruz to New Orleans. And in 1871 we started issuing our first sort of consular IDs a few years past until the Vienna Convention in 1963 where consular relations were regulated between countries. And then followed the unfortunate attacks of 1911 which made it necessary for our Mexican nationals to have a more reliable sort of identification in the US. And following this in 2002, Mexican government started issuing consular IDs of high security, matricula consular de alta seguridad, in order of 51 consulates in the US. This includes our embassy in Washington and 50 consulates mainly distributed in the south border of the US, Texas and California. We also issue currently issue consular IDs in Spain and Costa Rica as a means of identification. And in 2006 we started improving the security measures so we started including biometrics that includes of 10 fingerprints and a barcode. And then in 2014 we developed a new ID that was called second generation consular ID, which improved the already tied in security measures. And we included an electronic chip that is able to be read contactless. And we started printing in pet IDs, as well as including a more sophisticated design with microtext that makes it more difficult to be reproduced. So why is this relevant? Well, consular ID is a document that recognizes legal identity for Mexican nationals living abroad, as I said, regardless of their migratory status. And this is not exclusively for undocumented migrants, but of course this is of extreme usefulness for people living without documents abroad. And I would like to highlight four benefits and it is that it requires less requirements than... There are less requirements that a password is more economical. The consular ID in a five-year period costs $36, instead of a passport that costs over $100. And it also certifies the address for banks and other private entities. And also it's portable, so it's really practical for people to carry it around, whereas having a passport in your pocket can be a bit of a hazard. And for us it covers census purposes as well as consular protection. And as I've been saying, it's a form of ID not only before government, local and federal, but also for private institutions. Consular IDs are accepted in hospitals, schools, police offices. For vaccination, they became relevant at the start of the pandemic. And we've been also working with banks to ensure they are accepted in Mexico and in the U.S. And currently we have 10 states in the U.S. that have a high degree of acceptance of the consular ID. This includes California, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, Minnesota, Connecticut, Maryland, New Mexico, Washington, D.C., and New York. And we have a mixed acceptance in 41 states. And this includes Arizona, which recently joined other states that recognize our consular ID as an official ID. And we're also working with Mexican authorities also and also private entities to ensure that Mexicans living abroad, when they visit Mexico, they are able to use that ID without having to go through the process of obtaining a different ID in Mexico. So finally some really quick figures. We currently have, as of December 2021, around three million and a half consular IDs that are currently valid. And during 2021, we issued 700,000 consular IDs only in the U.S. This represents 24 of documents issued in our consular network. Just an interesting figure, 57% of the people that have a consular ID are men and 41% are women and only one and a half percent are minors. And our consulates that issue the most consular IDs are Chicago, Nandales, LA, New York, and Houston. And then finally, the way forward is in June 2022, we're launching our third generation consular ID that will have some security benefits. It will be printed in a polycarbonate card that is the one that most e-passports use currently. It will be printed with laser technique that makes it virtually impossible to be reproduced without authorization. It will have an invisible microchip embedded in the document and it will have holograms and UV reactive features. And it will also be inclusive because it will include the option of not reviewing sex or gender or marking an X in the gender or sex space for people that identify as non-binary or gender non-conforming. And it will be issued in any consulate regardless of the address of the person that requests it currently. You can only obtain a consular ID and your consulate of address. This is if you leave in LA, you need to get your consular ID in the LA consulate. But we're going to change that so it's more flexible since we have a unified database. And it will also include some features that are included in California and other licenses, driving licenses to make it easier for people to obtain such documents such as hide, wait, eye color and hair color. And finally, we will print minors and parents or two doors or in the back of ID as a means of fighting human and child trafficking, which is something that highly concerns Mexico. So this is a very quick overview of how I didn't go too fast, but I'm happy to answer any questions and especially eager to hear about our my fellow panelists will have to say about their strategies. So thank you again, Director General for this invitation and thank you for considering Mexico as a country that is putting the fight and advocating for legal identity. So very pleased to be here again. And thank you very much. Jaime, as as you rightly said, these constant, how legal identities and enabler of human rights and how with these consular IDs that have been issued one that they've been issued regardless of legal status and how it has increased access to a whole range of services. And I particularly noted with regard to to vaccination so there's also a social protection element as well. So depending on how the time goes we'll see hopefully we'll we can take questions at the end so so thank you very much again. And now, Mr. Thomas, I welcome you again to this discussion, and you've been working intensely on this topic in preparation for the IMRF, including as chair, as coding is chairing a committee on the global forum and for migration and development and global compact for migration relations. And we're really keen to learn about Sweden's experience in implementing GCM objective for to establish proof of legal identity as a policy priority. So a few questions here. First, what is needed to achieve non discriminatory access for all including migrants of all status legal status geographic access language barriers proceedings required financial barriers etc. What is needed to ensure that legal identity systems are rights compliant, and that legal identities are not used on often that are not used to unlawfully discriminate at at the border entries and admissions. Then what are the key operational and technical capacities which are useful for countries seeking to improve access to their civil registry systems and the issuance of identity documents. In particular regarding information and communications technology solutions with robust data protection measures. We heard some of this in the previous presentation. And what specific obstacles may prevent the inclusion of migrants in programs to increase their access to legal identity and documentation at their countries of destination. Mr. Thomas, you have the floor. Thank you very much. Deputy Director General Miss Daniels. And thank you for giving opportunity for a presentation on behalf of Sweden. My starting point is that it is a fundamental human right to be recognized as a legal person before the law. Sustainable Development Goal 16.8 on legal identity for all, including free birth registration by 2030 is included in the 2030 agenda and the commitments to leave no one behind. Proof of legal identity is a key requirement for accessing basic services and essential rights. This is also why states have committed within the global compact for migration objective for to provide all their citizens with proof of nationality and civil registry documents such as birth, marriage and death certificates. This should be available for migrants upon entry, stay and return. For migrants lacking proof of legal identity increases the risks of unsafe, irregular and disorderly migration. It plays into the hands of human traffickers and criminal smuggling networks. They increasingly sell authentic travel documents under false pretense. They use fake birth or marriage certificates to obtain genuine documents or using authentic documents of lookalikes. Lack of legal documents makes it more difficult for migrants to reunite with family abroad and to return to their country of origin. It presents an additional threat to migrants caught up in crisis and disasters as they may find it harder to access critical services, including international evacuation assistance. From a Swedish perspective, we appreciate the work of the UN Legal Identity Agenda Task Force. Also IOM is working to assist states in the assessment and improvement of identity documents, especially travel documents. There is a worldwide need since one billion people are estimated to lack proper access to legal identity. IOM is helping governments with the issuance of documents and management systems with the focus on well functioning and internationally compliant processes. There is a need in several developing countries to improve national civil registration. The current Swedish government intends to redouble its efforts to counteract the emergence of a parallel shadow society that feeds both segregation and crime. This includes a new panel provision on human exploitation and measures against irregularities and crime in the labour market and employment of people without work permits. The Swedish police has recently been given increased powers in regard of the international migration of internal migration control. This means that the police now can take photographs and fingerprints during internal aliens checks. A lack of controls of legal identity could also threaten public safety and be exploited by, for example, potential terrorists. Measures are also on the way to improve the Swedish population register to get better grasp on people who reside in Sweden. Everyone who lives in Sweden is registered and issued with a personal identity number, which is used in contact with government agencies, banks, hospitals, etc. The Swedish tax agency has recently received more funding to be able to detect, investigate and remedy errors in the population register. For example, it can now deregister false identities and make home visits to check a person's residence. As a European Union member state, Sweden supports joint EU efforts to improve information about third-conflationals crossing external borders. That is why we are now adapting Swedish law to the EU's new entry and exit system. It was considered a deficiency in early years that no data were available on people leaving the EU. In addition, the EU has a more general objective to fully digitalise legal identity through the so-called EID and authentication services. Regarding asylum seekers as well, the lack of passports has for a long time been a predominant issue. Last year, for example, 85% on average were lacking passports when filing an asylum application in Sweden. For several countries of origin, none of the asylum seekers could show passports. In some cases, passports and ID documents are found later on. So all these issues require measures domestically as well as through international cooperation. Now let me just give you three concrete examples of what the Swedish government has been doing. First, the asylum seeker card. Sweden has for a long time been using specific asylum seeker plastic cards with the photo as a proof that the individuals are asylum seekers. This is not equivalent to an ID card. However, it facilitates life in Sweden for the asylum seekers. The card also contains information whether the asylum seeker has the right to work. The card is helpful when contacting various authorities and employers and when opening bank accounts. Asylum seekers also have the right to reduced fees when showing the card at the pharmacy. The first of January this year, Swedish migration agency introduced a new form of the card which also contains digital information, digitally updated with the QR code. The second example is the right to healthcare for asylum seekers and undocumented migrants. This is available since 2013 as undocumented foreign-born persons have a legal right to subsidized care to the same extent as asylum seekers. This right covers people who stay more than just temporarily in Sweden without a permit. It also includes those who abscond from the execution of deportation orders. These individuals may have special health needs though. They may have poorer access to healthcare due to a lack of legal identity and it may also be more difficult to gain knowledge about the health situation in these groups. The right for migrants regardless of their legal status covers necessary care or care that cannot wait without it having serious consequences for the patient. This could for example be emergency care and care according to the Infection Control Act. It also includes maternal health care, care in the event of an abortion and contraceptive counseling. Asylum seeking children and undocumented children under the age of 18 are in addition entitled to the same health and dental care as people who are permanent residents of the country. My third and final example is about the right to schooling for undocumented children. This is also in place since 2013. These children have the right to education in preschool classes, primary school, special primary school and special schools. If they start their education before they have turned 18, they also have the right to go to upper secondary school and upper secondary continuing their education. Neither schools nor the social welfare board have any obligation to notify the police authority regarding undocumented families. In order to safeguard the anonymity of undocumented families, the school may decide to keep information about the student confidential. However, such a decision may also be revoked if it's a bill to court. So these are my examples. Thank you very much for listening and I'm looking forward to take questions and to hear your comments. Thanks. Thank you very much Christoph. There are some parallels with China's presentation and obviously you started by framing this within the context of human rights and the right to legal identity. You also talked about digitalizing legal identity as well as the links to social protection and health care and schooling. So yes, very much similar to the previous to the Mexican experience, but you also highlighted this issue of the parallel shadow society and the environment this creates for exploitation crimes and a whole range of human rights violations. So thank you. Thank you very much. And now finally, my last speaker, last but not the least, Mr. McCann, glad to have UNDP's perspective after this discussion and two national examples where we've heard their best practices as well as challenges. So I'd like to invite you to share with us UNDP's work to support legal identity for all and your recommendations on how to leverage partnerships through the UN task force on legal identity. How to improve registration systems including civil registries and access to documentation systems to ensure their rights compliant. We've heard a lot about rights today, which is, which is really important. That's what this discussion is grounded on. To ensure their rights compliant to address the legal identity commitment found in the SDGs and in the global compact on migration. Mr. McCann, you have the floor. Deputy Director General, thank you so much. And greetings also to my previous fellow panelists and to everybody logging in. UNDP is delighted to be partnering not only with IOM but with, as you mentioned at the start, a number of other UN agencies active in the field of population registration. Since 2018, we have a united UN position on the issue of legal identity, which broadly states that not only should everyone on the planet have the means to prove who they are, but that member states should implement systems that allow people to be able to have a holistic coverage of legal identity from birth to death. And what that means basically in practicality is that obviously universal birth registration is the gold standard of legal identity, but in cases where people for whatever reason are not able to produce a birth certificate as they move forward during life and states may decide and have indeed decided for many years now to roll out additional forms of identity management systems such as national ID card schemes, national population registers, or increasingly fully digital ID schemes. And wherever member states do this, those systems should be linked with the core civil registration system of birth and death registration. This is for a number of very, very practical reasons, one of which is that if you do not have any means to identify a teenager entering an adult national ID card scheme, national population register, when that teenager turns either 14 or 16 or 18, whenever the member state is issuing those documents. Well, if the teenager cannot identify themselves via a birth certificate, how do you identify that teenager entering the system? And if we are relying on things then like witnessing promises by local community leaders, etc., that this teenager is who the teenager says he or she is, that can be open to political manipulation, etc. In some countries, and it can be very, very problematic. Equally at the other end of the life cycle, if you do not link death registration with various forms of national ID systems, well then your database day after day is full of dead people. And then there's a problem of the overall confidence that the public has in the integrity of the identity management system. So that's the position of the UN, universal birth registration. And if you have then any form of national population registered national ID card scheme, link both of those schemes together. We are delighted to say that we do not have any policy disagreements that appears between any of the UN agencies in this arena, which is quite remarkable. And indeed, when it comes specifically to migrants and also to refugees and displaced persons. For example, we were delighted that UNHCR's position is of course that for refugees in host countries that have accepted them and UNHCR has registered them as refugees, member states, the government of the host country should include those refugees in their national identity management systems regardless of the issue of citizenship or nationality. So refugees should have access to birth registration, civil registration, death registration for any life events that occur on the territory of a host government and UNDP and I believe IOM has happened to support that position as well. There are a couple of specific areas where I think the world can do better with regards to migrants and in particular with regards to migrants in vulnerable situations. As we all know, there are many, many migrants that end up in a foreign country and for whatever reason do not any longer have access to any form of identity documents. This can be because they've just been lost or of course, as we are all aware, identity documents can get either stolen or indeed confiscated by employers or others manipulating the status of irregular and vulnerable migrants. And when those situations occur and in particular in countries where migrants do not have any consular representation, then there must be a way for migrants to be able to access and download digital versions of identity documents that will be recognized by the host country. And if we consider that all 193 member states of the United Nations have got together and indeed additional non-recognized countries have got together under the auspices of the International Civil Aviation Organization. And we have agreed collectively as a world what technical standards for passports are. They're now universally standardized across the world. If it's that possible to standardize plastic and paper travel documents, why is it not possible to standardize and agree what digital documents would look like in a manner that all member states of the U.N. could recognize. That could be an incredibly empowering thing for a migrant in a foreign country in a vulnerable situation where they've lost access to their identity documents. So not only should we be working towards the possibility for migrants or indeed anybody to be able to remotely access digital versions of their own documents from a foreign country, that there should be an international agreement that has foreign all countries except that they will facilitate and agree procedures to allow migrants to be able to access those types of documents. There was mentioned earlier by my two panelists about biometric registration and also we do desperately need at the global level, some form of standards now on the use of biometric technology, not just in the counter terrorism field, which at the moment within the United Nations is pretty much the only area where there is agreement on the use of biometric technology, including invasive biometric technology such as facial recognition systems. We need to be able to expand and set standards for the use of these types of technologies within public administration in general and indeed in the travel and migration context. I don't think many migrants, many travelers are too happy, for example, about the idea that in order to enter countries or be registered in foreign countries that facial recognition data is taken from them in a manner where they do not know how that data is being used, how it is being shared, how is it going to be deployed. And in particular, we have to be realistic with the increasing advent of use of CCTV cameras and use of facial recognition systems. I don't think there has been enough global policy discussion about discrimination of migrants and foreigners when using that type of technology and an impact or the extent of surveillance on particularly vulnerable migrants in foreign contexts. We need to expand that discussion further. Equally, we also have to work stronger on the issue of standardization of identity documents below the level of passports. IOM and UNDP have just finalized a publication on the creation of free movement zones, including a lot of very, very practical advice on how countries may come together in economic communities and agree the international standards on things like national ID cards that would allow those documents to be used as proof of legal identity in a migration and a foreign travel context. That should be expanded further. We are here to advise any countries that want to help go down that path. Those of us that do live in the European Union or in the Schengen area are very aware of the ease with which people can travel across borders using only national ID cards instead of passports. And we are available to expand support to any regional economic communities around the world that would like to develop similar systems. But also, even below the level of national ID cards, there's a lot of work to do, I feel, on general standardization of documents including birth certificates or death certificates. I happen to live in a country, Belgium at the moment, for example, where a German citizen coming to Belgium, even where German is an official language in Belgium, still has to get a birth certificate translated officially by a court appointed translator. Into French or into Dutch in order for that certificate to be recognized at the local municipality. That seems like a crazy situation for people from that country to be in. So why can we not come together, not just in this part of the world in Europe, but all over parts of the world, including in Africa or in Latin America, etc. And have countries agree on the technical standards for things like birth certificates that will allow them to be used as proof of legal identity in foreign countries without the need for crazy translations, etc. I know there's a problem with use of alphabets that are non-Latin, etc. But this does not seem to be an insurmountable obstacle. We have done it for passports. Why can we not do it for birth certificates, for marriage certificates, etc. In a manner that will allow people somehow be able to access and use those documents to prove who they are, even if they are not in possession of a passport or indeed a national ID card. So this are some of the things we can do. There's probably more. And I look forward to the future discussions. Thanks. Thank you very much now. It seems your key message is standardization, standardization, standardization, be it of birth certificates, death certificates, national identity documents as well. I'm also highlighting the areas where we need to expand to enable, for instance, free movement zones, as well as the use of biometric technology is potential for discrimination and more work there as well. I'm very, very conscious of time, so I won't be able to do any more justice to what was a really, really interesting presentation. So I'm quickly going to move to Dan, my colleague Dan, because I understand that we have some requests for the floor. Thank you. So Dan, over to you. Thank you, DDG. And this moment we have a free request from the floor. First one coming from Sri Lanka. His Excellency Mohan Pieris, Prime Minister of Sri Lankan UN New York, followed by a representative of Colombia, a fellow representative of Uruguay. Your Excellency, floor is yours. Thank you. Thank you for giving me the floor this morning. My delegation would like to thank the panel for the insights provided during the discussion. I thought they were very insightful and perhaps the last idea of standardization was very attractive. We are all agreed that legal identity is at the heart of combating regular migration. And in promoting regular migration, which contributes to the prosperity and development of both the sending state and the receiving state. Sri Lanka, as you know, has taken a number of measures to realize object before of the GCM and ensure that all migrants have legal identity and adequate documentation. Now these include in addition to law enforcement measures against illegal migration, the creation of an enabling environment to obtain legal identity such as passports and building the capacity of our foreign diplomatic missions, especially in countries where significant numbers of Sri Lankan migrants, labor migrants reside. So consular support is provided in obtaining legal identity where such identity has been lost or misplaced. Now in order to enhance migrant worker protection, standard employment contracts for departing migrant workers is a mandatory requirement for registering them with the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment. Educating migrant workers about the terms and conditions of a standard contract is conducted at the pre departure orientation by the Bureau. The registration at the Bureau assists in maintaining records and those who seek employment overseas and the grievance resolution process provides easy access through a passport number or a national card identity card number to information related to the employers or their family members. Recently an amnesty period was declared by the Foreign Employment Bureau for Sri Lankans currently working overseas who have migrated for employment through different channels without registration to register through the missions or the post outside. The purpose of this was to ensure their welfare and protection while bringing them into the system. Our diplomatic missions in labor receiving countries assist in renewing passports and registering birds and marriage certificates overseas. For those who don't have a passport, identity is verified and a temporary passport is issued during repatriation. A mechanism is already in place to issue debt certificates upon receiving reports of debts that have occurred overseas to family members in Sri Lanka through the relevant channels. And finally, legal identity is also crucial in facilitating the regular processes in sending remittances as those legal without legal identity are prone to using illegal money transfer mechanisms. In the wake of COVID-19 Sri Lanka also launched a dedicated vaccination program for prospective immigrant workers to ensure they are fully vaccinated prior to departure. The government also recognized prospective immigrant workers as an eligible category to receive the popularly preferred Pfizer booster in order to meet the requirements of some host countries. The success of Sri Lanka's vaccination drive for migrant workers. I must inform the panel was facilitated by the existence of a legal identity facilitating legal regular migration. My delegation would like to share these thoughts with the forum in the spirit of sharing best practices in addressing the issues of legal identity for migration and be assured that we will comply and cooperate with the international regime at all times. Thank you very much. Thank you, excellency. A second on our list is a representative of Colombia, Juan Francisco Espinosa, director of the Migration. Sir, floor is yours. Thank you very much, sir. I'm going to switch to Spanish. Buenos dias. Good morning. As you all know, since 2015, due to the weakening of the political and humanitarian conditions and the hyperinflation in Venezuela, we've had a deep economic crisis, which had caused a massive outflow of those who want to flee from the regime and insecurity and the threats in that country. Colombia is actually hosting a little over a million, 480,000 Venezuelans for August into 2021. We found 18% of them in the regular migration condition, 17% of them in a regular migration condition and 64% in the process to access the regularization mechanism designed by the Colombian government called temporary condition of protection for Venezuelan migrants. These two are implemented by the Colombian Migration Department and it is formulated as a mechanism in spite of strict respect for human rights to offer protection to the essential human rights to create regularization processes of the migrants taking into account their needs, allowing them to be incorporated to the economic fabric of the country and to have access to a visa, which will last for 10 years. This mechanism enables us to have a comprehensive analysis of the migrant population, which will allow us to formulate integration public policies focused on generating well-being for the migrants and the families, as well as their adaptation to the hosting community. Also, it allows the Venezuelan migrants to work in our territory in the same conditions as a Colombian citizen. They can also access to the institutional, to the public and private labor having the rights protected and also enabling the full incorporation into our country. One of the key elements for the regular migration has to do with identification and the formal documentation of migrants, apart from the importance of including strategies which can allow to give also an answer to the protection of the fundamental rights, which will also discourage irregular migration in a non-discriminatory way. The irregularity implies without any doubt an impact on the contribution of the migrants into the economy, as for example the remittances and also the tax payments. They make, however, not to know who is here in our country, represents a risk in terms of collective safety, and it is therefore a great barrier, a great hurdle to include everybody in order to legislate and to formulate socio-economic policies. And not to regularize migration also increases the difficulty of bringing criminals to justice and also it makes it difficult to prevent crimes in order to do all that, in order to tackle this topic of legal identity. This attitude allows the migrant from Venezuela to be inscribed in Colombia through a unique and exclusive Venezuelan migrant registration, where they have free access to this registry. After that, the petitioners, they should also fill out socio-economic questionnaire and that will allow the Colombian government to understand really all the situation these migrants from Venezuela face, and this will also help us to facilitate their incorporation and the inclusion process. And then in the second phase of this process, they have to come face to face this interview. We also here in this stage two of the process, the migrants will go through a biometric process and then they are given a document which is called the temporal permit which allows the Venezuelan migrants to stay in Colombia in a special migration regulatory process until 10 years to build a better present and future. The issuance of this permit means the re-publishment of the dignity of the migrants with the plastic high quality document which is formalizing the rights and duties of these Venezuelan migrants here in Colombia. In this process, obviously this has allowed us to identify some implementation challenges like obviously the budget development, the strengthening of the capacity and institutional coordination problems like for example the migrant smuggling and trafficking and xenophobia. But we have received the international support which has allowed us to complement the actions carried out by the government and to create synergies among the different actors to move forward in an efficient way to develop policies which will safeguard the human rights and to lead efforts to mobilize a coordinated response in the benefit of migrants and the host territories. This is why we would like to highlight what we are doing today here. I mean to look for alternative solutions to answer the challenges of the migration process and also to favor the exchange of ideas and approaches of development to generate the strengthening of international consultations and to look for common agreements. This is the document I was telling you about. This is what we give to the Venezuelan migrants. It's a very solid high quality document. Here in Colombia we are proud of our fraternal migration policy which protects people and allows us to dream a better present and future for all of us. We will always be willing to share experiences. Thank you very much. Thank you for this opportunity. Good morning. Thank you. We still have actually five countries that ask for interventions and I would like to ask all to be brief as possible. We also need to come back to the panelists and ask for the final words. Next on our list is Uruguay, first secretary of the permanent representative Juan Riva. Thank you and thank you also to Mrs. Deputy Director General for this opportunity. I'd also like to thank all the panelists for their very interesting insights and remarks on this matter today and if you allow me I will deliver this intervention in Spanish. Uruguay supports the global compact which we believe is especially relevant and fundamental to have a basic document supported by the international community which allows us to talk about the same language when it comes to legal identity. So we would like to also thank you for the support of the IOM in the whole of during this process and specifically in this context of the health emergency with regards to objective four of the global compact which is to ensure that all migrants are proof of legal identity and adequate documentation. I'd like to mention that the basis of the migration policy in Uruguay is to regularize migrants. We think that the contribution which is very positive starts with regularizing their situation. Having the relevant documentation allows the migrant to work, study, trade, access health services, housing and also to have the freedom to be involved within the legal framework of the country and also to be able to provide its contribution to the society. The migrant allows access is the processing of the identity document as soon as they start their residency. This allows them access to having services in the same conditions as other nationals. This is also related with the compliance of other objectives of the global compact such as objective six, which is to facilitate fair and ethical recruitment and safeguard conditions, also to provide the migrant access to basic services. We highlight in this last point that in Uruguay migrants have access to basic services and on the same conditions as other nationals with the effect of having an identity card on the same basis as Uruguayans. So for Uruguay to implement objective four is essential because providing documentation to the migrant is the starting point, allowing them to integrate in the society. And allowing with the implementation of objective four allowing the implementation of the other objectives such as two, three, four and etc. To increase regular points of accesses and not criminalizing it simplifying processes allows the state to have a reasonable view of the migrant population and we can then create public policy with with real information with these migrants. When they are already already in our territory in a regular way the information will be complete. Regularizing migrants also has another important issue with regards to security, it doesn't just allow us to have the relevant registration but also makes migrants less vulnerable before criminal gangs. And on this line consular services in Uruguay need to have the relevant tools in order to provide the relevant documents for those based in other countries and allowing them to regularize their own status abroad in order for them to access their rights. The strategy of regularizing migrants in Uruguay has been recognized by international organizations on this subject such as the IOM. And regardless of that we do recognize the challenges involved in complex situations such as the current one Uruguay commits itself to carry on working on the multilateralism and international cooperation, both at regional and world level. So in order to reduce irregular migration and to fight against smuggling and trafficking and all the kinds of exploitation and also to provide better consular assistance for migrants throughout their process. Mr. President, we are at your disposal to share our experiences and to try to be the best partner we can be in this process. Thank you very much. Thank you Uruguay. As we still have four representatives to ask for intervention, we ask each of them to be in one minute if possible. Very short intervention please that we need to come back to the panelists. Next one in line is Chad. Representative Chad please go ahead. Do we have Chad online? Yes, but not on muting. Now is turning on this camera. Thank you for inviting me and thank you for giving me the floor. First and foremost I would like to share something with you, an experience. More specifically about ID and documentation. There are very basis of the legal identity of our citizens and I would like to talk about law on ID documents in Chad which aims at being a universal law for everyone, for all citizens in the territory of Chad for children, children of migrants who are born on our territory and they are automatically registered in the database of birth and death and it's free. Registration is free. It's the main principle of this law. Everything is free. In the last few years we created a national office for safe and secured ID documentations. We decided to grant ID number for everyone living in the country and we also have the possibility to give like travel cards and travel documents for the migrants. And when we're talking about refugees, so we have a lot of refugees coming from various countries in Chad and so we had a project. So in this project we had the support of the United Nations Agency for Refugees and this project was called the project to support citizenship and fight statelessness and so in thanks to this project in our refugee camps, we've been able to give ID documents and birth certificates and also death certificates. So we wanted to make sure that people to make sure that they had everyone had a death certificate. So the Ministry of Security and Safety in charge of migrations have been able, thanks to the consular services, we've been able to give permits, rest and permits and many kinds of documents for refugees and we're here for that. Everything runs smoothly in the facilitation of the Chadian government is in the right line with the global compact for migrations. So today as we speak, Chad is complying with this convention for migrations and we're adapting our laws to cope with the current situation and to fight smuggling and human trafficking. We are guaranteeing the rights of migrants and their families. Thanks to Bill that may will soon be voted. I would want to spend, take too much of your time, but these were a few examples I wanted to highlight for you and to say that Chad is working hard and we are working on this. Thank you very much and looking forward to talking with you again. Thank you very much. I'd like to thank you to Chad but unfortunately concerning the rest, we still have the basically more Venezuelan and Portugal and unfortunately already run out of the time. I'd like to return back to the panelists for a concluding remarks and we'd like to hand over the floor to Monica Gorache, our DMM director, please. Thank you very much, Dan, and good morning and good afternoon to everyone. It's a pleasure for me to be able to be with you in this concluding moment of this very important panel and I would like to ask our panelists for last maybe a couple of words on legal identity, especially as we gear up towards IMRF. If you think about what you hear heard today and your perspectives, what are your wishes for the IMRF? And I would like to start with Jaime Vasquez Bracho. Well, thank you very much. I think one important aspect that has been highlighted during the panel has been digital access to legal identity. And that is something we could all work on, but not only digital access but also a mutual recognition of digital IDs and means of identification. So I think that is something that we can work on with the help of UN migration and ION. So I would just like to leave it there and say that we are currently working on sophisticating our digitalization processes to be able to not only access, not only renew our consular IDs but also to have some sort of electronic access to them. So I will leave it there and thank again ION for the opportunity to share our experience in issuing consular IDs. Thank you very much, Mr. Bracho. I think, yes, digital solutions are definitely very important. And especially now what we've seen in the past couple of years, we've been relying so much on digital, on our digital communication and work. So this is something that will certainly take away. Mr. Thomas. Yes, I would like to refer to what Mr. McCann, UNDP said about documents below the level of passport or ID cards. Because this is also important in order to contract the shadow society. In Sweden, one example of this is the so-called coordination number. This is used for individuals who are not formally registered in Sweden. And the purpose of the coordination number is to meet the authority's need for clear and uniform identity for those persons. The coordination number does not in itself confer any rights or benefits. Thanks to recent legislation in order to reduce the risk of misuse, the Swedish tax agency has been able to suspend a large number of obsolete coordination numbers to ensure that everybody in the country has a legal identity. For the IMRF, I would like to refer to discussions within the Global Forum on Migration and Development. The GFMD identified three major types of challenges. First, the lack of documentation as a basis to prove legal identity. Second, migrants who deliberately move without documentation. And third, the difficulties of effectively advising migrants on their rights, obligations and methods of seeking support. So the final conclusion is that the International Corporation should assist migrant source countries to ensure broader delivery of authentic birth certificates, ID cards and travel documents. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Mr. Thomas. These are very important points and both in terms of the work that we need to do on capacity development, but also addressing the shadow, which is the shadow world that many migrants are in, which is something that affects many different areas of migration. And that is so important also to combat irregular migrations. So these are very important points. And so I would like to go to my colleague from UNDP, Mr. McCann, for your wishes for the IMRF before we conclude this panel. Thank you. Thanks a lot, Monica. Wonderful examples from Mexico, Sweden, Colombia, Uruguay, Chad. Please remember as well a point I didn't get to mention earlier with the world we need to do more policy work on the issue of identity documents issued by non-state armed groups, an incredibly complex issue, no baby, no child born in a territory under the administration of a non-recognized armed group should suffer from the lack of legal identity because we don't recognize the authority of the armed group issuing documents. And that's a challenge a lot of member states are having at the moment and we need more international agreement on this. Let's not also forget global migration is going to accelerate. It's not going to decelerate. Temporary migration is going to accelerate and not decelerate. We are not speaking just of workers like agricultural workers, seasoned agricultural workers moving forward. We are going to see post-pandemic and explosion in the number of so-called digital nomads traveling around the world. And that raises very, very complex questions around taxation, for example. If you're living in one country but officially working in another country, well, then which government gets to tax you for living but with economic activity conducted in a different jurisdiction? And what I think we're likely to see in coming years to deal with that challenge is an increase in data sharing across borders between governments as they try to figure out who is this person that is coming and going for months at a time but doesn't appear to be working here, et cetera. They're a national of your country. How are we going to tax this person, et cetera? Increased data sharing for things like taxation creates an enormous responsibility on countries to at least have agreed standards around what identity documents that person is presenting to both jurisdictions. So again, this is another reason why I think we need to work a lot on the standardization of identity documents moving forward. And finally, any member state that wants to work with us, be it IOM, be it UNDP, we are all working together now, UNHCR, the World Food Program, the World Health Organization, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Women, the Population Fund, we're all together in this legal identity agenda task force, not competing with each other. So please, any of the representatives we have heard today, any of the member states that wants to work with us on both the policy side but also helping practically roll out of legal identity initiatives at national level including for vulnerable migrants and indeed refugees. Please get in touch with us and thanks to our IOM colleagues for today's event. Thank you very much, Nile, for this and for highlighting this joint one UN approach that is really exemplary in this field and also for raising the issue of this digital move that goes also into the future of work. Right, because there will be, you know, with this virtual work going on that will also raise a lot of issues and questions on what type of documentation one needs to have, what type of rights if you work for a country but you're not in that country. And so these are really very important points. So thank you very much to the panelists. Thank you all for participating and apologies. I would not take all the request for the floor. It has been a very interesting discussions from IOM's role within the UN network on migration. It is very important for me to highlight here that legal identity is one of our institutional priorities for the upcoming IMRF. And an IMRF and I think I speak on behalf of all of you who have been with us today with a strong progress declaration which includes a resolute direction from states about the road ahead to attain the GCM objective on legal identity for people on the move. And in fact why the IDM is separate from the IMRF process, our discussions here today will be really feeding into the preparations of the forum. So beyond this IDM as stakeholders gear up towards the IMRF, I want to take this chance to encourage reflections and policy deliberations around pledges that can bridge the gap for migrants without proof of legal identity. So as we gear towards IMRF, let us think about what are the commitments that will enable us to effectively address the issues that we discussed today. And how can we come up with the concrete proposals that can get us to a forward looking and attainable IMRF progress declaration, which will bring us into the next cycle of GCM implementation. So let's work towards IMRF, but think beyond IMRF. So with this I would like to thank you very much again on behalf of the Deputy Director General and my colleagues, and I give back the floor to you then. Thank you a lot Moneca and I'd like to one more time to thank you to all panelists and Deputy Director General and to you Moneca for a moderating this excellent panel one on the day two. Also would like to invite one more time and Zola, Guiana, Portugal and Sudan that didn't have a chance actually to give their intervention to this panel to send us in writing their intervention and we'll be glad to include them in our report. Now we are transiting to the panel to for today or what is with the title enhancing productivity and addressing inequalities for the future of human ability in pandemic era. And with this I would like to give the floor to the next moderator. What is the Megan Benton, Director of Research MPI International Programme MPI Europe Megan floor is yours. Thank you Dan and thank you very much everyone. Welcome, excellent these distinguished guests, participants, panelists and friends. Welcome to this panel on enhancing predictability and addressing inequalities for the future of human mobility in the pandemic era. As I said, I'm the research director for the Migration Policy Institute's international work. I also lead MPI's work on COVID mobility, which is supporting greater international coordination on order health migration and mobility. I also co-authored the joint MPI IOM report on COVID-19 in the state of mobility which was kindly included in the proposed resources. So I'm delighted to be moderating this this panel today which will consider evolving requirements for travel and admission and their impact on migration and inequality, as well as how the UN system can promote migrant inclusion through pandemic preparedness and response. I know yesterday we heard about very, very concrete steps to reduce risks and vulnerabilities for people on the move but today is really an opportunity to think ahead to how we build durable systems that facilitate mobility both today and in the future. Of course the pandemic has illustrated just how essential migrants are to their societies and the vital role they play across many economic sectors. The pandemic casts the often invisible work that migrants do as teachers and agricultural workers and care workers and cleaners into start relief. But people on the move were of course also disproportionately affected by the harms of the pandemic. They were more susceptible to job losses. They were often more exposed to the virus by virtue of being in frontline occupations. And of course the millions of migrants left stranded with one of the early most painful scars of the pandemic. Many of these inequalities have lasted through the second year of the pandemic or have been replaced with new ones that continue to be very troubling today. People on the move often suffer inequities in access to healthcare, in opportunities to social distance for instance because of congested housing or working conditions, inability to self-isolate and better costs of not working. And they were often excluded from social safety nets from stimulus and social protection packages to unemployment, making them particularly vulnerable to the socioeconomic impacts of the pandemic. These things are wrong in themselves, but they're also counterproductive. They create the conditions for COVID-19 and other pathogens to spread. And of course the vaccination has been one of the great dividing lines of equity in the second year of the pandemic. While some countries have chosen to vaccinate migrants and refugees alongside nationals, in others only those with a regular status are eligible. As of December, out of 180 countries, territories and authorities, 132 included refugees in their vaccine rollouts, 149 included regular migrants and 84 included irregular migrants too. And this is of course against the backdrop of the fact that only 13% of the population of low income countries has been vaccinated. So as many governments and authorities are moving towards vaccination requirements for crossing borders, as well as imposing often costly testing requirements, this is making cross border movement more costly and unequal. And of course the big concern here is that rising costs of travel and regular migration routes create incentives for disorderly unsafe and irregular movement or create the fertile ground for smugglers and traffickers to exploit. So what we want to discuss today is how to ensure that the process of building back after pandemic and planning for the next pandemic really embeds people on the move at its heart. How can we ensure that requirements for travel and admission don't further entrench inequalities in accessing regular migration? How can governments in the UN system strengthen mobility governance, especially as it relates to public health equity concerns and establish a more resilient global mobility system for the future? And how in this age of pandemic, can we keep our eyes on the prize of the GCM objectives and the goals of reducing inequalities as outlined in the 2030 agenda? So I have a terrific panel with me today to help address these questions. His Excellency Ambassador Rambutu Virabhutar is the Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative and Charged Affair of Thailand, the United Nations in Geneva. He previously served as the Director of Economic Division, the Department of ASEAN Affairs and Director of the Division of Development Affairs, the Department of International Organisations and in numerous other diplomatic postings in Europe and Asia. Dr Nedret Emiroglu is the Director of Country Readiness Strengthening for Health Emergencies at the World Health Organization. Her department is responsible for building cool national capacities to mitigate and respond to emerging risks and vulnerabilities, especially as it relates to vulnerable and low-capacity countries. She's had a long and distinguished career in public health and development and communicable disease prevention, including in the Turkish Ministry of Health and at the WHO Regional Office for Europe. His Excellency Ambassador David Donahue is distinguished fellow at the Overseas Development Institute. He was Ireland's Ambassador to the United Nations in New York, where he co-chaired three major UN negotiation processes, including the negotiations that led to the agreement on the Sustainable Development Goals and the wider 2030 agenda for sustainable development in 2415. And the New York Declaration on Large Movements of Refugees and Migrants in 2016, which led to negotiations on the two global compacts. I want to first turn to Ambassador Virabhutar. Could you talk please about how Thailand has promoted safe, healthy and orderly migration in the pandemic response and work to ensure that migrants are included in health systems? Ambassador Virabhutar, the floor is yours. Thank you, Madam Moderator and distinguished panel members, distinguished participants, colleagues. It's my pleasure to be part of today's discussions on the topic relevant to us. I will try to address two questions that are posed by Moderator. So based on Thailand's experiences, the key answers are migrant inclusive and corporations, which I shall elaborate more on this. Migrant workforce has been one of the indispensable driver of Thailand economies. During the COVID-19 pandemic, their life has been heavily impacted. Thailand therefore implemented a number of measures to reduce the vulnerability and to ensure safe and healthy condition of migrants' workers. We believe that they could serve as example of how to improve the predictability of human mobility in time of crisis. And first, predictability can be increased by creating regular pathways. National efforts could be supplemented by bilateral or regional corporations. Thailand has therefore concluded labor MOU with our neighboring countries as a clear demonstration of regular pathways based on bilateral corporations. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the border lockdown prevented workers return to their homeland. Thailand introduced temporary visas or work permit extension to prevent them from becoming illegal. We also allow for registration of undocumented workers from Cambodia Lao PDR and Myanmar who were staying illegally in the countries. Having migrants on record helped increase the effectiveness of migrant management and reduce the vulnerability of migrants and improve their protection. Second, predictability could be enhanced by efforts to increase access to basic services and social security for migrants. Healthy migrants can better contribute to the society they live and help improve public perceptions as well as reduce inequality in the society in line with the objective 15 of the GCM. Thailand is committed to enhancing access to health services for all, including migrants to the universal health coverage policy. Two health coverage schemes are offered to migrants, including the social security scheme for migrant workers in the formal sector, and migrant health insurance card available as an option for registered migrant workers in the informal sector, undocumented workers as well as their dependents irrespective of their documentation status at a very affordable cost of around $40 per year. To assist migrants in overcoming practical barriers such as language and lack of information, the government has further formulated the policy to promote migrant friendly health services. Migrant health workers and migrant health volunteer, also the instrumental in providing basic health knowledge and assistance to migrants in their native language. During the COVID-19 pandemic, they had also played an important role in disease prevention and control by among others coordinating active screening tests, quarantine, and treatment. Our national COVID-19 vaccine rollout plan includes everyone in the countries, including migrants irrespective of their status. So, migrants are also entitled to obtain COVID-19 treatment free of charge. And all this is of efforts and the key that Thailand used to promote safe and healthy migration with increased predictability. So, I am looking forward to exchange to be on this matter with you. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Ambassador. That was a really incredibly rich overview of the very practical and creative ways that Thailand has reduced vulnerabilities and ensured safe and healthy conditions of migrant workers. And I really like this guiding ethos of migrant friendly health services that you spoke about. I want to turn now to Dr. Nedrep Amaroglu to talk about the WHO work on equity and inclusion, especially as relates to people on the move. What's the role of migration and mobility issues within WHO actions and intergovernmental processes more broadly on pandemic preparedness? Thank you very much, Madam Moderator. And WHO is grateful to IAM for the opportunity to join this discussion and on a very relevant topic of addressing inequalities affecting the human mobility, particularly in the pandemic era. For WHO people's health, particularly the vulnerable populations, of course, which includes the migrants, refugees, as well as the internally displaced populations are of high priority. So what is a matter of principle, leaving no one behind, access to health. I'm not saying only health care or health services, access to full health, which includes the prevention, health promotion, as well as the older mental and social support, psychosocial support is included, including for preparedness for health emergencies. And unfortunately globally, we face probably the highest number of refugees and IDPs and migrants since the Second World War and currently and dealing with the again another conflict in Ukraine, which is now affecting more than half a million population. And reflecting on the past two years as we have learned from the pandemic and our response to them, we know that the vulnerable populations, particularly the migrants, whatever their conditions are, as well as the refugees can be left out, which increase actually the inequities. Particularly if you look at the COVID interventions, either it's the vaccines, as you mentioned, or if whether it is the testing, or if whether it is the treatment, as well as all the protective equipment like the mask and physical distance and all that, because they have to work in proud conditions, of course puts them into a lot more higher risk situation as well as because of their vulnerability. And we have a number of evidence on working together with the countries, some assuring full access, but unfortunately the policies are quite different depending on the country. And as you rightly mentioned, I think the some of the standardization to protect the most vulnerable in terms of access to health, also during the emergencies is a paramount effect. So one of the tools we have been working in partnership to improve access to which I can give us from the COVID example is the ACT accelerator, which is a partnership to improve access of particularly low income countries and the populations in need to the interventions available for COVID. Like if I could give an example for COVAX, which is the vaccine stream of the accelerator, it is up till now has been donating 1 billion doses to more than 144 countries. And then we are safeguarding a humanitarian buffer of vaccines for the migrants and refugees in the conflict or fragile settings where the states are not able to vaccinate those populations. So there are some safeguards on these fronts. And then there are two areas that I would like to kind of summarize on the work of WHO, which is relevant maybe to migrants. One of them is the travel and free movement, where we are particularly with the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee. WHO calls on countries to lift or ease international traffic bans, particularly the blanket travel bans, and also supporting the countries not to request the proof of COVID vaccination as the only pathway to enter or exit from a country. Again, that something has been restricting some of the population movements because of global access and inequitable distribution of COVID vaccines, and also requesting every country to recognize the WHO list in the emergency list of vaccines, not differentiating from those ones. And there are some effects on digitalization, but of course we know that from the previous panel also that this not going to resolve the whole issue. And then there are a number of member states driven political initiatives to strengthen the global health security, which we hope is going to also look into inequity, human rights, and particularly with a special focus to vulnerable populations, migrants, refugees, IDPs, and leaving no one behind concept has been initiated by the member states. One of them is looking into the WHO preparedness and response to health emergencies working group. This working group is reviewing all the recommendations from different external bodies and panels to be able to recommend a set of measures that the countries and also the international organizations, including the UN agencies needs to take. Then the other stream is the negotiations among member states, which is a World Health Assembly decision, asking the countries to start the negotiations to be able to identify whether there is a need for a convention agreement or another international instrument on pandemic preparedness and response, which is then again going to strengthen the global governance for health emergencies, health security, improve the coordination and ensure the highest political commitment, which is going to hopefully ensure also the financial resources. So that work has started that that is going to continue. That's a member states driven process, but we'll be concluding taking at least a period of two years to be able to give enough time to the member states to reflect their opinions. And the important point here is that the this negotiating body official negotiating body is going to have some public hearings with a number of stakeholders, including the UN agencies and I am going to be among those, but also a number of different stakeholders. So I would like to just conclude being that, you know, we need to work together. I think coordination at the global level has been critical. And that has been proven to be quite strong in the pandemic among UN agencies, but also other associations and philanthropic organizations, as well as a broad range of partners. And WHO is committed to improve the preparedness for emergencies for future potential pandemics, again, putting people at the center, particularly the vulnerable populations. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for that very rich intervention. That was a, I like how you started with this ambitious concept of health beyond health services, but also including prevention and giving such a rich overview of WHO action on pandemic preparedness and equity and this importance of coordination really, really came through. So thank you for ending with that point. Last but not least, I want to turn to Ambassador Donahue. Could you talk a little bit about progress on the GCM and the run up to the IMRF and how does the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic make some of these goals harder or easier to attain? The floor is yours, Ambassador Donahue. And you are still muted. Thank you. Okay. You can hear me now. Can you? Okay. Great. Well, first of all, it's great pleasure to be here. And I wanted to congratulate you on that MPI IOM report. I thought it was excellent. And it sets out in great detail the range of inequalities and vulnerabilities from which migrants have been suffering during the pandemic. I think that it brings into focus how far we have still to travel in relation to the inequality goal, goal 10 of the STGs. It was no accident that we inserted migration under that inequality goal or reducing inequality. It is a fundamental matter of justice and inequality that migrants should be given better access to all the services that the rest of us enjoy and should be given greater protection all around. So I think that we already were in trouble with goal 10, even in the last few years before the pandemic struck. And since the pandemic, it has all of these inequalities have been exacerbated. I hope that this will be a top priority for the IMRF. I've no doubt it will be. And going on from that really, the HLPF, the High Level Political Forum is another context in which we can try to address the fundamental inequalities we're talking about, suffered by migrants because of COVID. We have an opportunity in the High Level Political Forum each year in my view, not only every four years connected with the IMRF, but we have an opportunity every year to draw more attention to the policies required to support migrants worldwide. I mean, I have felt that perhaps more use could be made of the machinery for STG reporting, both from a practical point of view in the sense that the HLPF gives us an opportunity every year to talk about what countries are doing. But also perhaps from a political point of view, there may be advantage for some countries in presenting what they are actually doing on migration as something which furthers STG's implementation. Obviously, there are some countries where migration or the GCM are controversial, and it might be easier for them almost to use the cover of the STG's which are an uncontested agenda in order to recount what they're actually doing. So I see plenty of ways in which we can make creative use of the STG's machinery in addition to the IMRF. I won't go into too much detail, Megan, on this now because I don't have much time. But in the new round of the HLPF, there will be greater attention paid to cross cutting issues. And the role of migration in advancing the STG's is quintessentially something of cross cutting importance. So I would actually hope that we can, beginning this year, that we can have dedicated segments of the HLPF to the GCM and what has been done and what needs to be done. Obviously the report or the progress declaration which will go forward from the IMRF will be an important addition to this year's HLPF. But there's a lot more that can be done by countries nationally in their own national reviews to draw attention to what they are doing on GCM. I just think it's a fairly obvious extra resource, but we need to emphasize it from time to time that the two processes were always meant to be complementary. That's why there are so many references to the 2030 agenda in the global compact and indeed in the New York Declaration before that. And dare I say we also have in the 2030 agenda itself very clear-cut references to the links between migration and sustainable development. So I'll leave it at that, Megan. I think that the previous speakers in yourself have brought out very clearly the range of inequalities. And for me this is something which must be a top priority not only for the IMRF but also for the high-level political forum this year and going forward. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much for those concrete and creative ideas including how to encourage greater attention to benchmarking against SDG implementation to provide political cover or a complementary process. It's very important. There's a little bit of background noise. I have been instructed not to ask any follow-up questions despite having many up my sleeve because of how short we are on time. So I'm going to open the floor for questions and comments. And I think I'm going to hand over to Deanne here who already has a few in line. Thank you. First of all, thank you to all panelists and panelists and to you. In this moment we have the four requests for intervention. In this we'll start first to ask before head is Laura Townhead, Friends World Committee for Consultation. Thank you. So we just thank you to the moderator. Thank you to the panelists. We're glad to see this conversation here today and to see it build on the discussion in the IOM Council last year. And whilst predictability can contribute to the orderliness of migration, it does not inevitably make migration safe or regular, nor does it necessarily contribute to the well being of migrants and their communities. So we're glad to see the framing of this discussion clearly grounded in the importance of equality and human rights. And we encourage you all to keep this firmly in mind as you seek to find ways forward including through coherence between relevant channels of work as have been mentioned. And the questions for the panelists and for all of us really are what criteria are needed to guide human rights based predictability in human mobility in a pandemic area, era, and how and by whom will these be determined on the question of quite criteria we encourage reference to the work of the special rapporteur on human rights of migrants, OHCHR and the UN migration network. The recommendations in the special rapporteurs report on COVID provide some criteria, including undertaking independent regular reviews of any restrictions on travel adopted within the framework of emergency measures and ensuring that any restrictions on travel do not result in denying effective access to asylum or other protection procedures under international law. On the question of how and by whom guidance will be determined in the IOM council we highlighted the importance of engaging with migrants and centering their expertise and experience, and I reiterate that now. As the conversation continues we encourage you to enable migrant participation at all levels, for example at the national level through consultation and establishment of advisory groups including a diverse range of migrant expertise and experience. Participatory mechanisms will not only support development of effective policy now, but will enable faster and more fluid consultation when new challenges to mobility arise and I think sadly that is a when not an if. This offers an opportunity to pledge to establish such mechanisms. So we look to you all to ensure that this opportunity and the opportunity to contribute to enhancing human rights based predictability and human mobility is not missed. Thank you. Thank you. I would like to invite now represented to Venezuela to take the floor. They have currently not joined us panelists. Okay, then Argentina as of will follow Argentina please go ahead. Thank you. Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to say something. This is such an important topic very quickly because I don't want to take too much time. I would like to say that the pandemic has shown the capacity of governments to create to keep causes of migration and the traffickers had adopted very quickly to the urgent measures imposed by the countries using more dangerous routes increasing. The fees are exposed in migrants and refugees to the aggravated risks of the illegal traffic as violence and sexual exploitation. On the other hand, travel restrictions and the higher unemployment rates and increasing poverty levels are the stimuli for these trafficking networks to have more profitability with the regular migration including the return routes. And this scenario has also increased the risk for more crime crimes of trafficking and smuggling of migrants. Although they are very similar, they do have different operational factors. So therefore we need to keep on coordinating and taking into account the common features and the different features between these two crimes. These restriction measures, they also have a specific impact and sometimes it is exacerbated the impact especially in women and the different migrants. That is why the international debate on this topic should include the design and implementation of a specific measures, innovative measures which will reduce this impact in the most vulnerable groups among which we can highlight especially the women in extreme poverty, indigenous people and also displaced women. In this regard, the Argentine government has followed or has thought about the four next guidelines to advance in the regional coordination and strength and the fight against the illicit human trafficking in the right context. To increase the exchange of information to try to identify the changes of this crime in our region to try to adopt coordinated and homogeneous policies to increase the efficacy against this crime to contribute from the human rights and to lay the basis for the equity and non-discrimination of women and the LGBTI migrant group of the region through the cross-sectionality of the gender approach in the different actions and regional policies to review the current status of data and statistics integrating variables such as the sex or gender identity, ethnic or racial origin, national origin, sex, residency and other social conditions. And finally, to share best practices among the different regional bodies tackling the topic of women, girls, LGBT migrants to advance in the migration policy with the gender approach, trying to meet the intersectionality and the inter-culturality factor. Thank you very much. Thank you. We have still three more requests for interventions, and I would like to ask all to be short as possible, two minutes if possible. Next is Venezuela. Venezuela, please go ahead. We cannot hear you. Venezuela, are you there? Venezuela, are you there? It seems there is some technical problems with Venezuela. Let's go further to Angola, and then we'll come back to Venezuela. Angola is next, please. Do we have Angola online? They're not on muting yet. Okay, not on muting. Japan, do we have Japan because this is the third that haven't list? Yes, Japan. Do you hear me? Yes, please go ahead. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Keselovic, for giving me a floor, and also a great hope to the Dr. Benton and prominent speakers of the panel for your insightful inputs on the challenges of inequalities in human mobility affecting migrants. Indeed, human mobility around the world continues to be greatly impacted by the spread of COVID-19. This situation reminds us of the importance of the principle of leaving no one's health behind. Japan is strongly committed to realizing this principle by promoting universal health coverage and addressing great significance to ensuring equitable access to safe, effective, and quality eyeshadow vaccines, including in developing countries. From the human security perspective, we should affirm that all individuals, and in particular the vulnerable, such as migrants and displaced people, are entitled to freedom from fear, freedom from wants, and to equal opportunity to enjoy all their rights and free development of human potential. From this perspective, Japan's announced a contribution of one billion US dollars to the COVAX facility in addition to the in-kind support of 40 million doses of vaccine. Meanwhile, an integrated vaccine system from transportation administration is necessary to further promote vaccination on the ground. In this regard, as Japan has been steadily providing last one mile support, including the development of cold change systems, Japan also expects to see IOM leverage its rich experience in this area to play an increasingly important role in responding to the current and future pandemics. Japan believes that UN system, especially IOM and WHO, are the primary players for deepening international cooperation for action addressing inequalities for the future of human mobility. Japan continues to be an active person in this endeavor. I thank you. Thank you. I'd like to check now. Do we have more luck with Venezuela and the sound? I believe in the public of Venezuela. Floris, yours if you have a sound now. Good morning. Can you hear me? Yes, great. At first, we would like to thank you for the invitation to this important dialogue, which allows us to assess the current situation in a topic of such importance and which assessment has become even more urgent in the context of COVID-19. Venezuela has historically been a hosting country for migrants of all regions of the world, where their fundamental rights are being guaranteed as has the health care, which has been a priority for our government. The pandemic has imposed other dynamics to migration, not only for its human impact, but also of how economics have been affected, slowing down the growth. These are times of solidarity and dialogue. It's important to highlight the progress that Venezuela has achieved when it comes to border management. Bear in mind that the measures adopted in the migrant controls are based on the respect of the agreements complied with by the government. When it comes to the assistance of people, as long as it does not affect the health situation of the country, despite the sanctions that have been imposed as part of the unilateral measures which are translating to human rights crimes have allowed us to turn them into opportunities that become rights for migrants. We have created initiatives such as the Migrant Protection Roundtable. We also provided information and assistance points at the borders in order to carry out tests and also to provide health care for those people affected by COVID-19. This operation had the collaboration of such agencies, such as UN agencies accredited in the country, as well as tens of different organizations that provided technical assistance. This is a best practice to share since these experiences are always addressed to protecting human rights and the health care protection, both to nationals going back to the home countries. Also, the vaccination program is generally has been provided to all regardless of the migration status. Bear in mind that access to vaccines should be considered universal and our country has promoted dialogue and collaboration between home and destination countries. So we are always willing to listen to have bilateral and multilateral agreements and respecting the sovereignty of the countries and without ideological differences and bearing in mind human rights. In Venezuela, we consider migrants an engine of development in the economy and has to be based on their dignity and their human rights as an ethical commitment. And for this reason, we still support the roadmap for an orderly, safe and regular migration, which is an objective in order to reach a world peace, which we will be happy to discuss in the IMRF in May. Thank you very much. Thank you. Before we turn back to Megan, I would like to check if Guatemala can speak. I see them only as attendee as a panelist. Okay, it seems we have some technical difficulties. I would like to return back to Megan for a closing remarks of the panelists, please. Thank you so much and thank you to all of those who just spoke. There was some really rich interventions there. I'm going to now turn to the panelists for a response to anything that they have heard today, including to one another's interventions, which I think we don't do enough of sometimes on these panels. And so, yeah, I invite you to spend just two minutes on any reflections and closing thoughts. Ambassador Biributir, the floor is yours. You are still muted, I'm afraid. Oh, and still you switched it off and then I'll get on. There we go. Okay. Thank you again. In response to the question back from the floor. From our perspective, we think that our right to help is the basic human rights that all people have been granted. So it's the responsibility of the government to ensure, to guarantee that right. And it's not only limited to their national, but to some artists, people, I mean, in particular, migrants, workers in their country as well. And it's the responsibility of our lawyer-type government as well that you hear from what I just said in the discussion before. That the lawyer-type government, we provide access to health care services to all the migrant workers with regard to their legal status. And for the predictability, I mean, for the predictability of the migrants, we think that creating the regular pathway to the MOUs with our neighboring countries is going to be the key. And that helps us to have all the migration management as well because we register the migrants in the countries. And that is easier for us as well to guarantee the human rights for them, the right to help as it has been raised. But even though the migrants in the countries did not come through the formal channels or as a regular pathways, the undocumented workers can be registered and get access to health services as well. So I think the key point is that it should be the responsibility of the government to guarantee that basic right to help all people in the country, including the migrant workers as well. And but for the monitoring system, I think that HRC, Human Rights Councils and all the special procedure and mandate holders, they're doing the work. But the key things on this issue is that the government should feel that it's the responsibility of the government to guarantee that right. That's for the point that I'm going to respond at this time. Thank you. Thank you so much for those really inspiring, thoughtful comments. Dr. Imre Oglu, the floor is yours. Thank you very much for these rich comments and also some inquiries and I think I cannot agree more. I think when I started my intervention, I was defining health, right to health or access to health, regardless of the race, religion or ethnicity and with the particular attention to vulnerable populations, I think with the human rights and dignity. And I cannot agree more that one way of ensuring it is the universal health coverage as raised by Japan. Ensuring access to all services actually, as I said, prevention, promotion, without financial difficulties. I think that will be the way that once countries achieve that level, I think it's going to be critically important to have an inclusive coverage. Then there are certain things we of course do as well. I mean, like engaging the communities, community readiness and resilience for health emergencies and working with the local stakeholders and players. And we have very good examples. Some of them were addressing the migrants and trying to identify what their obstacles are in access to those pandemic COVID tools or any other health services and how we could overcome them. So I think we need to work all together and I cannot agree more that actually the pandemic increased the inequalities and that has been particularly critical in the travel restrictions where each and every country started to implement a different set of recommendations and restrictions, and of course that dire consequences, particularly for the migrants. I think the harmonization and the coordination is going to be critical for future so that we are better prepared and do not face the same difficulties. And in relation to that, I just want to conclude saying that we have excellent collaboration with IOM for years, which actually have been strengthened during the pandemic and also through a memorandum of understanding on the priorities and our joint actions and collaboration. I mean, I can give a few examples that like the WHO Global Action Plan on Promoting Refugee and Migrant Health is an example that requires a coordinated effort to ensure the health and access of health, as well as the friendly, migrant friendly and services at the local level looking into their needs and requirements is some of the areas that I could give as examples. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for these very thoughtful and rich reflections. I much appreciated. Ambassador Donahue, the floor is yours for final reflections. Thank you very much, Megan. You can hear me, yes. I think if we want to see how we can enhance predictability for human mobility, there are many ways, obviously more transparent government policies, better coordination between individual governments, a more integrated approach to border management. There are quite a range of measures. More fundamentally, we can achieve better predictability by creating more regular pathways and ensuring easier access for migrants to the markets and countries that they want to get into. But I was struck by a point that Laurel Townsend made about the human rights dimension that we have to bear in mind. And I think Laurel was absolutely right and it caused my mind there that one of the ways in which we would probably achieve better predictability is by the use of greater use of digital technologies in order to make border management more automated and more efficient. So that at one level would perhaps accelerate procedures and be ultimately to the benefit of migrants. But hidden within that, or not so hidden perhaps, is the risk that the human rights of migrants will be threatened by those very technologies. First of all, migrants who don't have access to the technologies, who are not digitally literate as they were, but then also the risk of data privacy not being observed, the risk of a range of factors being plugged in through automation, which would ordinarily be part of decision making. So I mean, on the one hand, predictability may need greater use of digital technologies in future, but there are a lot of human rights risks hidden within that. And I think that thought occurred to me as I was listening to Laurel. Thank you very much, Megan. Very rich discussion and very well moderated and I learned a lot. Thank you. Thank you so much for those really those great ideas to finish with. And if I may, I just have a few concluding thoughts to add in myself. I think we've heard today that the pandemic hasn't created many of these issues with health access and and human rights concerns. It's been a complicated and an amplifier of existing inequalities and challenges. But I was also very struck from the representative from Venezuela's point. There's also been an opportunity for strengthening solidarity and dialogue. I think when it comes to health measures and mobility, I'm struck that it's important not just to see vaccination as the only pathway for entering a country. But thinking about health measures and border management as part of a comprehensive approach with multiple tools for risk management and really centering the discussions about vaccine access as we've heard, rather than focusing on just vaccine verification and enforcement. As we think about the IMRF and future discussions on this topic and moving towards a global architecture for mobility and pandemic preparedness. I think clearly we've heard it's important to streamline the rules to improve transparency and harmonization, digitization and coordination of these rules, but also to mainstream equity within these discussions and think about them in conjunction with regular pathways, for instance. And then thinking about the next steps. I like to see this conversation as continuing the one that we had at the IOM Council and thinking through how to take it through to the IMRF and also Ambassador Donahue's point about also using the high level political forum. Thank you so much everyone. Thank you panelists. Thank you everyone who participated for such a rich discussion today. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to moderate. This has been a really interesting session. I'll hand back to Dejan at this point. Many thanks everyone. Thank you Megan. Thank you to all panelists. And we are now slowly but not that actually slowly quickly. Welcome to the next panel. Next panel is on Migration, Environment and Climate Change, and I would like to give the floor to our next moderator. This is our colleague. I am a special animal for migration and climate change. Caroline Dumas. Caroline, please floor is yours. Yes, Dejan. Good afternoon or good morning to all our, to all the persons and the participants, our panelists and the participants. Welcome for those who were not already online to that first session of the International Dialogue on Migration 2022. And a session which is which is focusing, you know, on the global compact for migration implementation in practice. And we are in day two dedicated to facilitating regular migration and our panel is focusing on migration, environment and climate change from adaptation to regular pathways. Maybe a few words before greeting our panelists. This, you know, this panel and the objective of this panel is to reflect the work in progress or the progress in implementation, if I can say, of the commitments taken in the framework of the 2018 Global Compact. Commitments which were for the first time to recognize, I mean, as a reality, migration linked to climate change and disasters and environmental degradation. The Global Compact was a follow up, if I can say, or registers after the 2015 Paris Agreement Sandi framework for disaster risk reduction. We do have now, I mean, the, the, the duty in a certain sense, I mean, to stop, think about the implementation of the Global Compact. We have maybe to think on how states can develop tangible action to integrate migration and migration issues into climate change and disaster risk policies, but as well the reverse and as well vice versa, how I mean climate elements, climate change elements can be integrated in migration policies. So although significant progress has been made to advance political discussions on migration in the context of disasters, climate change and environmental degradation at the global level, a coherent and systematic implementation of global commitments and recommendations needs to continue to be strengthened. The panel will also discuss state pledges, maybe, and how states can work towards more improved, more and improved regular pathways for migration in the context of disasters, climate change, environmental degradation. So to discuss these, these important themes today, I am happy to, to greet several, I mean, several panelists, we're going maybe to start and we have the great honor to greet Ambassador Davina Hosseini, who is representing, representing the Egyptian government. Ambassador Davina Hosseini is Deputy Assistant Foreign Minister for Migration Refugees and Combating Human Trafficking in the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. She has a long, I mean, a long career, long diplomatic career, but she focused as well and spent several years of her career working on migration issues. She participated as well in the process leading to the adoption of the global compact for migration, and she will present us as well today. I mean, the, the line and the position of Egypt as future Presidency of NEXCOP, which is COP 27, happening in Sharm El Sher in next November. So, Ambassador, you have the floor. Thank you very much for your forthcoming. Thank you so much, Ambassador Doulmas for the introduction and good afternoon, Excellencies and distinguished participants, or good morning. I would like at the beginning to thank you for inviting me to participate in this important meeting in preparation for the first review of the GCM. And in my presentation, I will share with you the vision of Egypt on the climate change migration nexus, the policy responses that we will try to advocate in Egypt's capacity as COP 27 President. ahead of the IMRF, I wish to reiterate that Egypt is committed to a holistic and integrated approach to migration, to respect the human rights and dignity of migrants, and ensure that migration remains a choice, not a necessity. Climate change is already upon us. Internal and external migratory waves result from both rapid onset and slow onset events, and displacement due to climate induced natural disasters and extreme weather events are consistently on the rise. And its adverse effects have become a reality for millions of people worldwide. I believe that if we do not act now to step up climate mitigation and adaptation measures, coupled with the necessary means of implementation, the number of people displaced by climate change will continue to multiply. This is particularly true for countries that are the most vulnerable to climate change, which paradoxically contribute at least to the climate crisis, yet are the most impacted by its devastating consequences. It is estimated that by 2050 climate change could force around 216 million people out of their homes, 85.7 million of them are in sub-Saharan Africa. Climate change often combines with challenges such as poverty, salination of soil, decline in fertility of land, and for sure this has aggravating the pre-existing socioeconomic and governance challenges in addition to peace and security impacts. All these factors create complex drivers for migration, and they have a multiplier effect on migration as captured in Objective 2 of the GCN. Indeed, for many development countries, climate change and migration are two major sustainable development issues. For countries like Egypt, for example, according to recent World Bank reports, Egypt is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change, which is threatening the densely populated Delta region due to sea level rise. It also faces these factors of increased water scarcity, changing precipitation patterns, rising temperatures and heatwaves, and declining agriculture productivity. This will create a huge risk of displacement as well as overseas migration in search for better livelihoods and new opportunities. The government, Egypt is committed to investing in preventative measures and adopting to climate change to achieve food and water security, as well as creating job opportunities in the green economy and enhance international cooperation to create legal pathways for our needs. The government adopted a decent life initiative that targets the lowest income villages and cities across the country, including Delta and Alexandria, that are the most vulnerable to climate change. The initiative includes components for upskilling the young men and women and providing training and career advice in addition to job opportunities in order to prevent decisions of irregular migration out of desperation. As a host country for around 6 million migrants, Egypt is expected to receive increasing flows of persons affected by rapid and slow onset impacts of climate change throughout Africa. Egypt is committed to advancing policy coherence to address this challenge and enhance the resilience of host communities. In addition to ensure the human rights of the vulnerable to the migrants, the impact of climate change on mobility requires us to step up our collective efforts in a number of areas simultaneously. First, we must continue to build resilience and adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change, particularly current and short-term impacts such as droughts, heat waves, cyclones, water scarcity and flooding. At the country level, we need to integrate climate-related risks including forced displacements in national planning and peace-building efforts. Having said so, it is obvious that not all countries have the capacity to do so at the level of institutional or financial capacities. Second, we need to increase support for addressing loss and damage. At COP 27-26, the Glasgow loss and damage facility was launched to support efforts to address loss and damage and increase financing, technical assistance and capacity building. We look forward to further building on this outcome. Third, adaptation efforts need to be complemented by means of implementation and financing, as well as action to mitigate and reduce emissions from all sectors. Through a just transition approach. Or investing in prevention and disaster preparedness, early warning systems, risk assessments and forecast models can help prepare and also prevents future displacements and help communities become more resilient and less exposed to disaster risks. Doing this requires again more capacity building. Fifth, it is essential to increase investment in climate-smart solutions and adapt international financing structures to better link humanitarian assistance to development initiatives. Sixth, enhancing regular pathways and supporting ethical recruitment for legal migrants. And this is a very important adaptation approach, as mobility can be a vehicle to creation and transfer of resources, providing new livelihood opportunities and enhance sustainable development in both countries of origin and destination. In that regard, the proliferation of negative migration narrative is a key challenge that we need to address to ensure dignified mobility. Last but not least, I think that the concept of vulnerability needs to be put at the center of current and future responses to environmental migration. The most vulnerable may be those who are unable to move, or what we call trapped population, or those compelled to risk their lives to find a better future in order to develop appropriate policies to mitigate the impact of climate change. Distinguished participants, I believe that the upcoming IMRF provides a golden opportunity to highlight the linkages between climate change, environmental degradation, and displacement. And we look forward to more concerted action to promote the robust implementation of the GCM and achieve better coherence between the climate and migration agendas. Thank you so much for your attention. Thank you very much, Ambassador. It's really helpful to listen to your government's views on, first of all, maybe the adverse, increasing adverse effects of climate change all over the world, the risk of more displacement, population displacements linked to the adverse effects of climate change, being one of the drivers, and I found it very interesting that you integrated as one of the important drivers, not the main one. And being an inclement change and the degradation of environment coupled with disasters, both on slow and fast onset, as you said, are multipliers to insecurity and vulnerability of populations. So we heard clearly that you do think that the world has to build more resilience to help affected populations, to build more resilience, to be able to adapt better, also to increase, I mean, there is a need to increase adaptation measures, preventive policies, preparedness, early warning systems, to integrate all these policies in migration policies as well. And last but not least, to enhance the regular pathways to help mobility when it is necessary, mobility being adaptation, of course, itself. And I do find interesting that you support IMRF, of course, and we will wait for Egyptian support to the IMRF as a good opportunity, as you said, to enhance these triangular links. So maybe we can go further and maybe ask you one question, which would be as well how to be able to measure progress on addressing precisely migration in that context of disasters, climate change. How, I mean, do you think, I mean, how is your government, I mean, again, measuring progress or, and how do you think, and what do you think, I mean, if we think about the COP about next COP, you're going to preside over, what wish do you have in this measurement? How do you want the word? I mean, to be able to bring the proper measurement, if I can say, for proper, I mean, handling, if I can say, of migration. Thank you. This is a very important question because evidence-based policies and data is crucial to abide policies. In Egypt, we have a, like, we did like a mapping for the most vulnerable governance rates, vulnerable for climate change. We established an early warning system and it is important that this is followed up regularly and amended according to the impact that we see. I feel that the real challenge is how to create a coherence or perhaps how to find synergies between the climate change targets or objectives and migration-related ones in the GCM and sustainable developments. How to create this synergy between the different indicators. I believe that this requires a lot of capacity building and a lot of coordination between the different ministries. I think that nowadays climate change is not only an issue for the ministries of environment or relevant dealing with environment per se. There should be like a cross-cutting way of looking at the impact of climate change from all its different angles. Thank you. You are muted. Sorry, Karoline. I'm very sorry. I was muted. No, thank you very much, Ambassador, for your answer, which is extremely important. And that question of the cross-cutting dimension now of climate change on one side and migration anyway on the other and the points. The important links between these two trends are extremely important. We'll come back maybe to your answer and to that dimension after we listen to our other panelists. So I would like now to give the floor to an American voice, if I can say. I mean, we are happy to greet in this panel, this is Aileen Vadel, who is the Deputy Director of the Office of Population and International Migration, PRM, in the State Department, American State Department. So you are Mrs. Vadel, you are the focal point for climate change and migration of the Office of Population and International Migration. You are also the focal point for the GCN. So we are happy to greet you on this panel, even more, if I can say, after that very interesting and important report which was issued by President Biden's administration a few months ago, precisely on the impact of climate change and, well, its consequences. So ready to listen to you, you have the floor. Good morning, good afternoon to you all and thank you so much, Special Envoy Dumas, for the opportunity to discuss climate and migration this morning. It truly is a pleasure to be here to speak on a topic of such importance and urgency. As the Ambassador noted, we've all witnessed in the last years how the effects of the climate crisis increasingly drive mass displacement. You know, we've read the World Bank's groundswell report that notes that climate impacts could displace 216 million people within their countries by 2050. And these potential movements spotlight just how crucial it is that we act now. And as you noted last October, the White House released its report on the impact of climate change on migration. And the primary goal of that report was to understand the scope of the challenge and ensure that our policy responses are effective, thoughtful and strategic. And this report is our roadmap moving forward and it is a whole of government effort driving policy and programming efforts today and in coming years. Efforts that we believe have the potential to have a profound effect on the climate crisis. So consistent with the GCM objective too, the Biden-Harris administration has redoubled efforts to minimize the adverse drivers that push people to leave their countries of origin, such as regional violence, corruption, economic insecurity and the overall lack of opportunity. And we are particularly focused on addressing the impact of climate change on migration. We continue to support trusted partners to anticipate, prepare and respond to climate-induced migration and displacement and to scale up support to communities to reduce the risk of climate-related disasters and strengthen resilience to the impacts of climate change. Just in November of last year, the president announced his emergency plan for adaptation and resilience, better known as PREPARE, to help more than 500 billion people in countries adapt to and manage the impacts of climate change by 2030. Through our work with IOM, the State Department's Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration funds programs, such as training for government officials on migration and climate change and capacity-building programs that take a proactive approach in supporting regional, national and local coordination mechanisms to prepare for and respond to climate change, including through implementing the migrants and countries and crisis guidelines. Similarly, in line with Objective 5, the United States also seeks to avert and respond to displacement through safe, regular migration pathways and through strengthening access to assistance and protection for people displaced by the impacts of climate change, both across borders and within their countries of origin. Although we know displacement as a result of climate change is not itself a basis for a claim of protection under the 1951 Convention and the 67 protocol, or even U.S. law, people fleeing their countries in the context of the adverse effects of climate change and disasters may in some instances have valid claims for refugee status. To better address issues of protection in the context of climate change, the United States is looking to strengthen the application of existing protection frameworks, update U.S. protection mechanisms to better accommodate people fleeing the impacts of climate change, and evaluate the need for additional legal protections for those who have no alternative but to migrate. For example, we're exploring various protection options and policy tools such as whether legislative changes to temporary protected status could bolster protection, as well as improving protection of IDPs and vulnerable migrants outside our national boundaries. On refugee resettlement policy, we have harnessed our role as co-chair with UNHCR of the annual tripartite consultations on resettlement to focus on climate related displacement. So we are hoping that actually this summer to discuss a bit further at the ATCR the possibility of incorporating climate related implications into considerations for third country resettlement. And finally, we continue to raise the impacts of climate change on migration in multilateral bodies. We recognize the need to collectively work together to prepare for and respond to the effects of the climate crisis. On President Biden's first day in office, he rejoined the Paris Agreement. And just in December of 2021, we in our revised national statement, we announced our support for the vision of the GCM. We've also actively re-engaged in bodies such as the regional conference on migration and the intergovernmental consultations on migration asylum and refugees, which we will actually chair in 2023. So we look forward to the International Migration Review Forum and the opportunity to discuss more. Combatting climate change is not just a U.S. or regional issue, but we recognize a global one. And we're committed to working with all of you, with member states, civil society and our international partners to find opportunities to face these climate challenges together in ways that are safe, orderly and humane. Again, it's my pleasure to be here today and I thank you. Thank you very much to you, Director. It is really interesting to see how United States are committed precisely to answer objective or to try to fit in objective two of the GCM. To see how much you have increased your dedication, if I can say, to preventive measures, adaptation, including that emergency plan on adaptation, you just mentioned. And to understand as well how much you develop your policy to respect objective five as well. We heard your new commitments about protection and the reflections going on on the question of protection, which is really interesting and encouraging as you say for, I mean, those of migrants who have no choice than to leave their places or dwellings. I'm glad that you look forward to the IMRF and we look forward to a high level delegation from United States. We do, of course, in IOM support totally the view that that question of an intersection between climate change and mobility is indeed a global subject. I mean, you mentioned, I mean, local, national, regional engagements, policies, and of course work for all of us, but it is a global subject and that we will bring as well. We'll try to bring up to next cup. Thank you very much. Maybe, you know, another question as well, I mean, to to feed that discussion and I could ask you maybe coming to to the end, if I can say the development, what regular pathways have your government or has your government develop to implement it precisely for migration in the context of disasters. And climate change. Yes, so that's, you know, we are looking at right now and I, you know, it was noted in the report, you know, of looking at the potential for a separate legal pathway, but then also looking at, you know, as I noted about the temporary protected status about, you know, what would be sort of the climate that we consider, I mean, we already use, we call it TPS, we already use that in for countries that are affected by natural disasters but how could that, you know, be expanded or the legislative changes that could occur to sort of make that more encompassing, along with, you know, other regular pathways. It's something actually right now that we are discussing it's, you know, a lot of these what has been really great about the report actually has been pulling together all of the different agencies within the US government that climate change is not sort of on its own, that it's, you know, it touches throughout and it's being incorporated through all of the different work. So working with, you know, our partner agencies and looking at each of these. So that's, that's exactly the conversations that we are having right now. Thank you very much to you. You might come back to you in the, in the discussion. And let me greet. Maybe now another voice and I must I'm really glad because it's a very feminine panel panel today, if I can say, we, we do have another lady who is the voice of the most vulnerable that she, she, she has worked with a lot in her life, Dr. Margaret Agama Annette. Good, good afternoon, maybe. Doctor, you are the acting director for health and humanitarian affairs in the African Union Commission. So we are very glad to, to, to be able to, I mean, to, to listen to you. You have a long career having served on humanitarian, I mean, the humanitarian side, but as well health, psychological health and different other dimensions. I mean, the Ghanaian armed forces, but as well different PKO's all around the world before, before joining Unes and before joining the African Commission now today. So we're listening to you and to the views of the African Union. Thank you to you. Thank you very much this afternoon and thank you for the kind introduction and allow me to stand on all existing protocol and established protocol as I would please also your participants at this forum. The topic is quite an interesting one for me and I think I would like to begin by introducing the fact that the Africa Union Commission, of course, is a policy oriented organization in which policies are adopted and endorsed by heads of state and government for implication by implementation by a 55 member states. One of the key policies that has been adopted most recently, which is important for this discussion is the African climate change strategy, which has been adopted by all of our member states. And which aims to build resilience of the African continent to the negative impacts of climate change with specific emphasis in order to achieve not only the STGs, but the aspirations of agenda 2063. The second important initiative which has also been adopted by the Commission and which was put together in partnership with IOM and other key partners was the climate mobility initiative, which is to support the continent to harness the potential of potential of human mobility in the current climate crisis. Now, from where I sit on the humanitarian side, I think it's extremely important to have the discussion and to make the strong linkage between migration and the humanitarian context and situation on the continent. Given that Africa holds over 80% of the climate humanitarian situation, 80% of the global humanitarian situation exists in Africa, and some of this is climate induced and has which has resulted in forced displacement. Now, forced displacement then becomes our entry point because then it's also linked with mobility and the fact that we then have all these refugees who are across the continent and often denied free movement. They have issues with legal identity and also have issues with civil registration. Now, while the African Union does have a number of policy documents to address the refugee situation broadly, which include the 1969 OAU Convention, the 2009 Kampala Convention, the continental migration policy framework and so on and so forth, an area that needs really to interrogate in some depth and pay more attention is the whole area of migration and forced displacement, which has also resulted in increasing the refugee burden of the continent. And it is for this reason and for some of the issues that I already raised that the continent is focusing on the protocol of free movement, which is to be ratified or expected to be ratified at least by 15 member states in order for it to come into force. This protocol currently has only been ratified by four countries, albeit that we have 43 signatures, and there's a need for increased advocacy in order to, for this protocol to come into force, given the impacts that it's going to have. And on the migration situation that we are talking about and the aspects here have delved into depth, its depth and the humanitarian situation that has been experienced across the continent. And in May of this year, the continent is going to host its second humanitarian and pledging conference. And one of the main thematic areas that shall be discussed shall be climate change, disasters and forced displacement in Africa. We see this as an opportunity for engagement and for in depth in discussion prior to COP 27, which we are proud that Egypt shall be hosting to interrogate the entire issue of climate change and development, climate change and mobility, and to establish clearly and find durable solutions to address the issues that have emerged because of migration and as a result of forced displacement and the humanitarian situation that exists across the continent. I think I can stop there and remain open for further discussion, but I hope I've framed this in a way that will allow us to have a more in depth discussion moving forward. Thank you very much. Thank you very much to you, doctor. And it is, well, it was very interesting, I mean, to listening to how, I mean, and we know it somewhat, but not so well. I mean, how Africa built its own, if I can say, mechanisms of dealing with this situation, mechanisms and beyond, of course, real strategies. I mean, you were mentioning the climate change continental, I mean, strategy, plus the new African climate migration and migration initiative. And maybe, I mean, and then the, maybe, I mean, the enforcement, I mean, a strengthening of and ratification of the protocol for free movement, which is an interesting perspective. I find it very interesting as well that you, you do articulate the dimension of forced displacement and durable solutions. I mean, the development dimension and the durable solutions, which are always necessary as well. And on which I am is, of course, focusing as well. So maybe my question to you would be maybe more focused on objective five of the GCM, GCM objective five. I mean, how, how would the continent as you can see it would enhance availability and the flexibility of the pathways for regular migration in the context of disasters and climate change. What are the possibilities still ahead, what needs to be done, maybe in the first step at the COP or even later on, the IMRF, the COP and maybe beyond. Thank you very much for this question. And I think there's one thing that we should establish is that a lot of migration does care across the continent, which is, which is quite regular. And most often, when the question comes up about regular migration, the focus is intercontinental then on intercontinental migration, which also takes place. In effect, in the context of disasters and climate change, the first is really to have this continental protocol ratified, which then would allow free movement from one place to the other within the continent, and would ease the restrictions which also take place across borders, because one of the challenges to first displacement and climate incidents are borders, the borders that exist across the continent. The second response that the continent really is looking into is the establishment of the African Humanitarian Agency. Our member states have endorsed its protocol, plans are very well in advance, the framework is ready, and we are actually going through the final steps to get this agency established. It's about time that Africa, given the burden within the continent, it is about time and our leaders see it as a necessity to have an African Union Humanitarian Agency to take sure the leadership, the political will, and the commitment to addressing the situations which arise out of such incidences which are driven by climate change and other disasters. Thank you. Thank you very much. Very, very interesting. Maybe we can come back to these two, I mean directions and elements later on. Thank you very much, doctor. I would like now to give the floor to an important NGO voice, if I can say, and give the floor to Katie Ober, who is a senior advocate and program manager for the climate displacement program, precisely, at Refugees International. Katie Ober, you have at least a decade of experience on climate migration, displacement issues, including, which is not the least, being one of the co-authors of the very well known Groundswell reports, preparing for internal climate migration. So, we're ready to listen to you. The floor is yours. Thank you Ambassador Dumas. It is my pleasure to be here and such distinguished panelists. I'd like to note though, although my title on the screen says I represent Refugees International, I also sit here as a steering group member of the climate migration and displacement platform, and also as a participant of the Civil Society Action Committee, which recently released a paper on civil society priorities towards the 2022 International Migration Review Forum. And I encourage folks on this call to to read that paper. Out of the 12 key priorities, climate change features quite prominently. That's no mistake. And as the latest IPCC working group to report on impacts vulnerability and adaptation underscores, we are in the midst of a climate crisis. Scientists have already observed increases in the frequency and intensity of climate and weather extremes, including hot extremes on land and in the ocean, heavy precipitation events, drought and fire weather. This report also makes clear the magnitude of existing and coming climate change impacts is much larger than previously acknowledged and is already contributing to displacement and humanitarian crises around the world. For those living and working on the front lines, this is this assessment is obvious, and it has become more obvious, more existential with every year and every day. And that's why civil society has been so vocal about the need to include climate change and relevant migration policy frameworks, including the GCM. In fact, civil society is responsible for important touchpoints within the GCM that are related to climate change, including but not limited to objective two and objective five. However, the GCM and these objectives while noteworthy still require reflection. Civil society is hopeful that the MRF may serve as an opportunity to lay out these objectives in full detail and with renewed commitments, including from the United States. And I'm very gratified by the presence of Ms. Waddell on this panel, and I believe it sends an important signal. First, states must be clear on what minimizing adverse drivers entails. Logically, developing adaptation and resilience strategies to climate change means more adaptation planning or disaster risk reduction, especially by countries on the front lines. However, it must also be acknowledged that it means high emissions countries have the responsibility to support such endeavors financially and technically. High income countries have already pledged $100 billion per year for adaptation financing under the Paris Agreement. But can this approach be reaffirmed with the GCM process? It's not just about the amount of money earmarked for adaptation. Ken states pledged to increase access to long term multi-year flexible funding that responds to locally defined needs and resource gaps. This understanding and framing is aligned with the goals of the grand bargain in the principles for locally led adaptation. Ken states outline what responsibilities they may share related to migration in the context of climate change if these pledges aren't met. At the same time, objective two cannot be an excuse to focus solely on root causes. Even with increased investments, there are limits to adaptation. And yesterday's IPCC report made clear we're already in the era of loss and damage or irreversible impacts due to climate change that adaptation will not adequately address. States then must determine what enhancing availability and flexibility of pathways means in this era of loss and damage. This is particularly important in the face of slow onset events. My friends and colleagues in the Pacific have requested more good faith efforts to offer bilateral or regional approaches to novel pathways, including resettlement and planned relocation options to other countries. This is important. At the same time, states must also strengthen existing pathways. I think the Nancy protect. Multiple tools to admit and protect people displaced across borders and the context of climate change do exist, such as humanitarian visas temporary protection immigration quotas or free movement agreements. Some which have been outlined by the other speakers, but their implementation is unpredictable and uneven. For example, cases of temporary admission post disaster at the complete discretion of immigration officials at the border. This has meant in the past admission has been unevenly applied based on the country of origin, race or religion. How can states ensure that the tools they'll no doubt highlight at the IRF work in practice for those that need it most. How can they ensure that these pathways are consistent. It's also an opportunity to highlight gaps and proceed to be reflective and reaffirm that responsibility sharing and collective action is crucial and urgent to tackling those gaps. Thank you very much for this. This call as well, if I can say, you raised the question of the fun. I mean, adaptation. I mean, you're sharing mostly if I can say same views as the previous panelists, but you're raising the very important dimension, which is this financial support. But that's what the technical support. So I was thinking about maybe or you maybe that you were thinking about the Santiago network and the concretization or operationalization, as it is said, on the financial. I mean, I mentioned I would like to retain that you insisted that financial support beyond I mean all the promises which have been made up to now. I mean, the 100% including the doubling of adaptation of finance finance must be predictable, must be flexible and must be on multi year programs. It is indeed extremely important to do it as much as we can when it is still time because the other important message you passed is the message on the limits to adaptation. We all heard in COP 26 in Glasgow, some, you know, few countries from the Pacific or the Caribbean region and islands telling us that it was nearly too late. So that question of accelerating adaptation as much as possible, I mean, on a parallel basis to mitigation, of course, is crucial. And then when displacement has to happen, enhance the pathways, as you have said. So I would like now maybe to turn to open the panel, I mean to the questions which might have raised to each of our panelists. Is there are there a few questions that Dejan, you would like to highlight? What I could see at this moment, we don't have any requests for intervention. Therefore, we'd like to invite all participants, we still have 231 participants online for the questions or comments. Yes, thank you. So maybe do our participants, yes, want to ask a question, I mean, either the panelists among themselves or other participants who might want to ask questions again on that pass, if I can say from adaptation to the legal pathways precisely and regular pathways. Guatemala asking for the floor just to promote to the analysis that actually presented to Guatemala can speak. Marcus, can you promote? Interesting, so it could be the volume. Yes, yes. Thank you. American country. Thank you. Guatemala, go ahead please. Guatemala, you are welcome to intervene if you wish. Muchas gracias por darme la palabra. Thank you very much for giving me the floor on such an important topic, which is the impact of climate change on migration, which is especially important for us. As one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change, Guatemala recognizes the importance to face the structural causes that incentivize irregular migration. And for that, we consider it's essential to create programs to promote the economic development of the source communities in accordance with the sustainable development goals. According to studies carried out on the causes of migration in our country, population migrates mainly due to the lack of food or jobs. And to that we have the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. So it's essential to implement initiatives that face the migration phenomenon on a comprehensive way. The adapting to climate change and sustainability are essential. An example of this is that in our country, our country's working is with the UN system, specifically for the Economic Commission for Latin American on the implementation of the integral sustainability project. There has created different priority projects to strengthen value chains. And it's also important to mention environmental sustainability and the strengthening of the responses that allow for human mobility. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for taking the floor because you are strengthening, if I can say, or stressing that dimension that was raised of climate change as one of the drivers, but acting as a multiplier. I mean, you mentioned the poverty, the lack of employment and different other triggers for migration and forced migration. Then I found it very interesting what you're saying as a whole. I mean, the necessity for a whole society approach integrating, you mentioned the private sector and SMEs. And this is very, of course, very important that we have a whole society approach with including institutions, governments, but as well civil society as we just heard, of course, plus the private sector helping as well, supporting, including on the financial dimension which was raised by our last panelist. Thank you. We have one more intervention recorded and this is representative of the Carvalho-Kelso. Please. Thank you, moderator. The new IPCC-6 assessment report points to the heightened vulnerability in rural areas due to high reliance on climate-sensitive livelihoods. Climate change has a negative impact on food production and food security. This proportionately affects rural households and small-scale farmers with direct and indirect implications for migration and displacement. Migration is a common adaptation strategy for rural households. To social and financial remittances, it has the potential to strengthen households' adaptive capacity and contribute to building climate-sensitive livelihoods. Forced migration and migration that is understated via irregular pathways, on the other hand, have been shown to perpetuate vulnerability. To support migration as positive adaptation to climate change, FAO works with rural populations to address the adverse drivers of migration, promotes the sustainable use and management of natural resources, and helps create climate-resilient livelihoods and green employment opportunities in rural areas. The role of migration as adaptation needs to be explicitly recognized by states and supported by creating safe and regular pathways for those who choose or need to move in the context of climate change. To harness the positive contribution of migration to climate change adaptation, it is critical to create enabling environments in areas of origin, transit and destination, and recognize gender-specific needs. This will require improved coherence and coordination between sectoral policies and programming, as well as enhanced collaboration between policy actors. Thank you. Thank you very much, sir, as well. It's important to have the voice of the FAO and insisting on the fact that migration is an adaptation strategy and that it has to lead to sustainable development. Thanks to all, I mean, the positive, of course, impact and the positive, I mean, les apports, sorry, in French. I can't find my English word of migrants when they are moving. You as well insist on the necessity of accurate policies, I mean, to entrench, I mean, development and the sustainability of these policies, which is extremely important. Maybe before we part, I would like to ask our panelists, each of our panelists, maybe if she had, or she had, sorry, a last message or comment on what was said in this panel, like in two minutes, a short message that you can send us before we leave, and before maybe we meet in other contexts, I hope. Thank you to you. So maybe Ambassador Nevinel Hosseini. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate the very insightful remarks made by all the panelists and the participants. A few ideas came into my mind. The first one is the differentiated impacts on climate change, particularly for developing countries. Well, 70% of the countries that host refugees are developing countries. So I think this is a factor that we need to take into consideration. And perhaps the, since we're discussing refugees issues as well as forced mobility, I think it's important to emphasize burden sharing and common responsibility. Because as the developing countries would be the most affected by the impact of climate change, I think we need to ensure that there is enough support for these countries. That's interesting. And the panelists from the refugee international was rightly mentioned the limits of adaptation. I believe that it is very important to emphasize the importance of prevention. And to bear in mind the impact of some developmental projects. The third point is that the climate change is a threat multiplier, particularly in the African context and its relation with the peace and security. So again, we need to think again of the humanitarian developmental peace and security nexus and how does the climate change affect this nexus. I think that's it from my side. Thank you so much. Thank you very much to you. Yes. Thank you for reminding us if I can say it was said by one of our panelists of that very important question of the responsibility of each, if I can say country or group of countries and the peace and security nexus of course. Maybe Aline Wedel, if she's still online, director if she wants to say a few words. Thank you. It is an excellent listening to everyone and just thinking about I think what comes across so clearly is that you're in agreement on that the physical, social, economic and environmental vulnerability. Combined with climate change can undermine food, water, economic security and that, you know, we as we hear, you know, the secondary effects of climate change are equally corrosive and spur displacement, threatening livelihoods of entire communities, weakening governments and even in extreme cases resulting in political instability and conflict. So, you know, for us looking forward to the IMRF, you know, we are very much interested in evidence and database approaches, as well as really discussing with others. And we've heard today, you know, some of the innovative approaches to mitigating the impacts of the climate crisis, both in prevention and adaptation. So we look forward to that. Thank you very much for this intervention as well. And you're right, we all need, first of all, to work on evidence and database to feed, I mean, the whole, I mean, thinking about this growing problem and then, yes, innovative responses may be as much as possible. And adapted responses precisely to each situation on each continent and each level of vulnerability towards climate, whether onset, I mean, slow onset processes or fast onset events. Thank you very much. Maybe our, I mean, I don't know if Dr, if Margaret Agama is still online, maybe not. And I'll give the floor to refugees international to KV over again. And I understand that Morocco would like to take the floor if we still have two minutes. So maybe we'll lower the hand and we can go towards the representative of Kaili Ober. Thank you. Okay. Okay. So, Kaili. So, yeah. Kaili Ober and I'll come back to the doctor Agama. Thank you, Ambassador. I appreciate it very much. I think I came away with two points from this panel. One is that climate change is on the agenda. It's imperative that we all discuss this on and it's gratifying to see the amount of engagement. This is receiving both at this dialogue, and which I hope will transfer to the IMRF. I think, too, we've very clearly made the links between different sorts of international frameworks and mechanisms that need to be underscored, including the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement and pledges around adaptation. And I hope that the IMRF will reaffirm that and amplify that. So, all in all, I feel positive about sort of the developments we're seeing today, especially from different member states that are on this panel. And I'm looking forward to further engaging as a part of civil society and I hope that civil society will continue to have a strong voice in the IMRF process, especially because it holds such a special place within the GCM negotiations around climate change. Thank you. Thank you very much. Very, very interesting and I'm happy if I can say that there is a little bit of positiveness in that very heavy precisely agenda. And maybe Dr. Agama, if you wish to take the floor again for your conclusions or small comment. Thank you very much. I shall be very brief and thank you again for the invitation this afternoon. But just to say Africa as a continent is open for engagement around issues related to climate change, migration and humanitarian issues. And we look forward to welcoming you and hosting everybody at the Humanitarian Summit, which will take place in May of this year, 25th to 27th in Malabu, and of course COP, which take 27th, which will take place in Egypt later on. Thank you very much. And I wish everybody all the best. Thank you. Thank you very much to you. And on that really positive note, yes, I think we can say that we can look forward first, I mean, in the calendar to the IMRF and to amplify, as Katie Ober said, I mean, these questions we were not, which were not so acute, maybe in 2018. And this is precisely the role of the IMRF to do a review, I mean, as transparent as possible and as objective as possible to bring into new input, if I can say in the GCM, integrate really that dimension of climate change, which has been really worsening, have a worsening impact on human beings and on so displacement. And so looking forward to IMRF, but looking forward to the other rendezvous that we have, yes, with that Humanitarian Malabu Summit, which will be definitely a landmark to the COP in Egypt, of course, to next COP 27, where at least IOM would really like to see. And I understand that we'll have support if I listen carefully to what you have told us. We really would like to see some progress in the way, I mean, human displacement is recognized in a certain sense in the whole narrative on climate change. I mean, climate change has human implications. And we do hope that these human, if I can say, implications are taken care of in the good, I mean, in the right channels in COP 27 and as a global commitment or commitment by the international community. I know other, of course, important subjects are on the table, which are new concepts as climate justice, but they are linked. They are all linked. And we would say that maybe climate justice and the responsibility we heard about of different parties are linked to a better way of accommodating, I mean, life on this planet, despite the very, very serious impact of an aggravating climate change. Thank you really very much to each of you, to all our participants for their patience, and I hope to have the opportunity to meet with you again in real life, if I can say, in these different moments ahead in the months ahead. Thank you very much to each of you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Bye. Thank you so much. Goodbye. Thank you. Bye. Thank you, Karun, and all panelists for our last session for today. And I would like to remind everybody that tomorrow we're starting at 9am New York time or free here, Geneva time. Thank you all and see you tomorrow. Thank you very much for your help. Thank you very much for the help of the whole team, Dayan. Thank you. Thank you to you.