As of June 2025, the UN High Commissioner on Refugees stated that 117.3 million people worldwide were living in forced displacement from their homes due to war, human rights violations, or climate change–exacerbated conflicts. That’s more than one out of every seventy people on this earth.

Over forty million of those people had fled to a country other than their own, and this border crossing carries its own challenges. Being able to legally build normal lives where they settle enables them to integrate into society and share their skills with their new homelands.

Lisa D’Annunzio directs the US office of global refugee legal advocacy nonprofit Asylum Access, which defends refugees’ legal rights to move freely and work in their new countries while their asylum claims are being processed.

Refugees have these rights on paper in many countries, but how they’re treated doesn’t always match up to the law. Major international treaties, such as the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, state that displaced people cannot be returned to their home countries where they face credible threats to their lives or freedom. Later treaties give refugees additional rights,…