Speaking yesterday before the United Nation’s Third Committee, Archbishop Celestino Migliore, the Vatican’s permanent observer to the U.N., urged the
world body to defend and protect the rights of refugees around the globe, in the name of human dignity.

Speaking on the 'Report of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), Archbishop Migliore said that the protection of refugees involves "not just defense from outside hostile forces, [but] touches the whole spectrum of human rights of those forced to flee.”

“Such rights”, he said, “remain constant during all phases of repatriation, reintegration, rehabilitation and reconstruction."