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Today the world is home to more displaced persons than at any time in recorded history, leading to complex challenges for many countries as they try to manage these flows and successfully welcome these new citizens.
Yet these challenges are made even harder by a lack of accurate, accessible information in the media, where myth and misinformation are prevalent. At best, coverage concentrates on refugees as victims and the wider humanitarian implications, and at worst focuses on the challenges involved or the imagined threat of a sudden influx of outsiders. Almost completely missing from media coverage are the multiple benefits for the host countries, and the countless stories of individuals, often highly educated and eager to work, seeking a new life and contributing positively to their new societies.
UNESCO has created a course curriculum for journalism and media training institutions on Reporting Migration with a Focus on Refugees. The curriculum focuses on the fostering of partnerships to allow a more balanced view of the situation.
Here are some of the most common and damaging media myths surrounding the issue of refugees:
MYTH: Refugees are a European problem
Actually, Europe is home to just 6% of global refugees, compared with 39% in the Middle East and North Africa, and 29% in the rest of Africa. Among Syrian refugees, the vast majority are in the bordering countries of Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq. While more than one million refugees arrived in Europe by sea in 2015, this represents just 0.3% of the continent’s total population.
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