UN holds first-ever summit on refugees

The UN rights chief yesterday made a rousing appeal to confront the world's "race-baiting bigots" at the first-ever summit on refugees and slammed the United Nations for failing to end the war in Syria.

World governments pledged at the summit to scale up efforts to confront the biggest refugee crisis since World War II, adopting a political declaration that human rights groups have criticized as almost meaningless.

"This should not be a comfortable summit," Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein told the gathering at the UN General Assembly.

"The bitter truth is, this summit was called because we have been largely failing. Failing the long-suffering people of Syria, in not ending the war in its infancy," said the UN high commissioner for human rights.

In a toughly-worded speech that draw loud applause from the hall, Zeid took aim at "bigots and deceivers" and pointedly said "some of them may well be in this hall this morning."

"The defenders of what is right and good are being outflanked, in too many countries, by race-baiting bigots, who seek to gain, or retain, power by wielding prejudice and deceit, at the expense of those most vulnerable," he said.

The rights chief spoke of "an epidemic of amnesia" among leaders "who seem to have forgotten the two world wars" and warned that the darkest chapters of history could return to be played out again.

The summit kicked off a week of high-level diplomacy as world leaders are set to address the annual General Assembly meeting, which this year will be dominated by the conflict in Syria.

A record-breaking 65 million people are on the move worldwide, fleeing wars such as the carnage in Syria, repression and poverty, including 21 million refugees competing for too few resettlement opportunities.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launched a global campaign against xenophobia, saying it would seek to "turn fear into hope."

"We must change the way we talk about refugees and migrants," said Ban.

US President Barack Obama will host a second summit today at which some 40 countries will make new offers of aid, either by taking in more refugees or supporting access to education and jobs.