The skyrocketing numbers of refugees and internally displaced persons across the globe, estimated by the United Nations at 65 million worldwide, have shaken the European Union, roiled American politics and fueled calls for external military intervention in certain conflicts.

The causes of this refugee crisis, as well as the politics behind international assistance, will be addressed at this Up to the Minute panel.

Ninette Kelley, director of the New York office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and formerly the head of the UNHCR mission in Lebanon, will explore the drivers of these refugee flows and the difficulties in mustering effective international assistance.

In response, the Woodrow Wilson School's Frederick Barton will address the politics behind refugee funding and impulses for other forms of international intervention. Barton is former assistant secretary of state for the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations at the U.S. Department of State, former UNHCR deputy high commissioner, the highest-ranking American in the agency and co-director of the Scholars in the Nation's Service Initiative at Princeton.

Jeffrey Laurenti MPA ’74, former executive director of policy studies for the United Nations Association of the United States of America, will moderate the panel.