United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a part of the United Nations. The purpose of this agency is to protect and support refugees when governments or the UN ask for help. The UNHCR helps refugees return home out of their voluntary will, settle locally, or move to a third country according to the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and other international law. The agency's headquarters are in Geneva, Switzerland. It is a member of the United Nations Development Group chaired by United Nations Development Programme.^[1] The UNHCR has won two Nobel Peace Prizes in 1954 and in 1981.^[2]

List of High Commissioners

#	Photo	High Commissioners	Nationality	Time
–		Fridtjof Nansen	Norway	1922–1927 League of Nations High Commissioner
1		Gerrit Jan van Heuven Goedhart	Netherlands	1951–1956
2		Auguste R. Lindt	Switzerland	1956–1960
3		Félix Schnyder	Switzerland	1960–1965
4		Sadruddin Aga Khan	Iran	1965–1977
5		Poul Hartling	Denmark	1978–1985
6		Jean-Pierre Hocké	Switzerland	1986–1989
7		Thorvald Stoltenberg	Norway	1990
8		Sadako Ogata	Japan	1990–2000
9		Ruud Lubbers	Netherlands	2001–2005 (Resign due to internal investigation)
10		António Guterres	Portugal	2005–2015
11		Filippo Grandi	Italy	2016–present

Related pages

• Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees