FILE - In this April 2, 2020, file photo, a policeman, foreground, accompanies a group of migrant laborers, who came to renew work permits, to a migration centre in St. Petersburg, Russia. A new U.N. report announced on Friday, Jan. 15, 2021, estimates that the COVID-19 pandemic reduced the number of international migrants by 2 million by the middle of 2020 because of border closings and a halt to travel worldwide — an estimated 27% decrease in expected growth. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky, File)
UN: Pandemic reduced migrants by 2 million by mid-2020
By Edith M. Lederer
Dmitri Lovetsky / AP
FILE - In this April 2, 2020, file photo, a policeman, foreground, accompanies a group of migrant laborers, who came to renew work permits, to a migration centre in St. Petersburg, Russia. A new U.N. report announced on Friday, Jan. 15, 2021, estimates that the COVID-19 pandemic reduced the number of international migrants by 2 million by the middle of 2020 because of border closings and a halt to travel worldwide — an estimated 27% decrease in expected growth. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky, File)
(United Nations) — A new U.N. report estimates that the COVID-19 pandemic reduced the number of international migrants by 2 million by the middle of 2020 because of border closings and a halt to travel worldwide.
That represents an estimated 27% decrease in expected growth.
Clare Menozzi, principal author of the report by the U.N. Population Division, told a news conference Friday that for the second half of 2020 “we have a sense that it will be probably comparable, if not more so.”
She said international migration had been projected to grow by 7 to 8 million between mid-2019 and mid-2020.
A collection of interviews, photos, and music videos, featuring local musicians who have stopped by the WITF performance studio to share a little discussion and sound. Produced by WITF’s Joe Ulrich.
