The Sahel region continues to grapple with a complex humanitarian crisis, with approximately 4 million people displaced across the Central Sahel countries of Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and neighboring regions — around two-thirds more than five years ago. The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) warns that this crisis is escalating due to a mix of factors, including insecurity, limited access to services and livelihoods, and the devastating effects of climate change.
During a press briefing in Geneva on Friday, Abdouraouf Gnon-Konde, the UNHCR's director of the Regional Bureau for West and Central Africa, called for urgent international assistance to address the mounting humanitarian crisis in the Central Sahel region.
“While most displaced people in the region remain within their countries, cross-border movements are becoming more frequent, putting pressure on host communities and national systems,” Gnon-Konde said.
“These onward movements highlight the urgent need to expand scant assistance and enable people to remain closer to home, avoiding dangerous journeys.”
Insecurity across the region exposes people to violence, forced recruitment, movement restrictions, and arbitrary detention.
“Women and children represent 80 percent of forcibly displaced people in the region, and gender-based violence remains a critical and pervasive concern,” the UNHCR official stressed, adding that the number of people impacted by such incidents has significantly increased this year.
Furthermore, over 14,800 schools have closed in the region, leaving 3 million children without access to education or safe spaces. Forcibly displaced youth face challenges regarding their protection and livelihoods, such as forced recruitment, human trafficking, and limited job opportunities, which can lead them to take dangerous journeys beyond the region.
Healthcare infrastructure is also deteriorating, with over 900 health facilities having closed, leaving millions without essential medical care.
“Food insecurity has become a growing driver of displacement; the share of displaced people and host community members citing it as a cause for their movement has doubled in recent years,” Gnon-Konde said.
“Climate-related shocks further amplify risks, intensifying competition over scarce natural resources such as land and water, creating additional barriers to peaceful coexistence and social cohesion with host communities.”
Despite these difficulties, Gnon-Konde highlighted the resilience and solidarity demonstrated by communities across the Central Sahel. UNHCR data indicates that 90 percent of displaced people in Mali feel a strong sense of integration with local communities, which generously share land and resources. Similarly, local conflict-resolution mechanisms promote coexistence between displaced populations and host communities in Burkina Faso.
UNHCR's goal is to strengthen protection, inclusion, resilience, and solutions to support states and communities in managing displacement while fostering stability and self-reliance. However, both humanitarian access and funding are strained.
Funding declines
In the Sahel, humanitarian needs have risen sharply, yet resources have declined drastically since 2022.
“In 2025, UNHCR requires $409.7 million to cover humanitarian needs in Sahel countries, but has only raised 32 percent of this total. Critical activities including registration, documentation, education, health and shelter have been drastically impacted,” Gnon-Konde said.
Over 212,000 refugees and asylum seekers in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger remain unregistered, which limits their access to essential services and puts them at risk of arbitrary detention and harassment.
All Central Sahel countries have ratified the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol. They have also adopted national asylum laws that provide a framework for refugee status determination and inclusion—including the right to work and freedom of movement. They have also ratified the Kampala Convention on internal displacement.
To effectively address the crisis in the Central Sahel, the UNHCR is calling for renewed and strengthened international commitment. The magnitude of this humanitarian crisis cannot be tackled alone by the countries in the region.
“Protecting millions of displaced families and securing a safer future demands more than words; it requires unified, sustained international action and true solidarity with the Sahel,” Gnon-Konde said.
In response to questions, the UNHCR official stated that 75 percent of displaced individuals are internally displaced. He added that people did not want to leave their countries due to a lack of access to borders and insecurity.
The wider Sahel crisis
Unprecedented humanitarian needs are driven by armed conflict, deteriorating security, political instability, rising prices, and widespread poverty, particularly in the Central Sahel (Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger) and the Lake Chad Basin (Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria).
The deepening humanitarian emergency is exacerbated by the effects of the climate crisis. Rapid climate change heightens the frequency and severity of natural disasters, such as severe flooding. Devastating floods in 2024 affected more than six million people across the region, following extreme flooding in 2022.
Currently, 33 million people in the six most affected countries are in need of humanitarian assistance, including 5.9 million in Burkina Faso, 3.3 million in Cameroon, 7 million in Chad, 6.4 million in Mali, 2.6 million in Niger, and 7.8 million in Nigeria.
The latest waves of displacement in the wider Sahel region have pushed the total number of people forced to flee to over 10 million, including those in countries bordering the Lake Chad Basin.
More than 7.6 million people are internally displaced within their own country in the wider Sahel region, primarily in Burkina Faso (2.1 million IDPs), Nigeria (3.6 million IDPs), and Cameroon (1 million IDPs). At least 2.4 million people across the six most affected countries have sought refuge in neighboring countries.