Note: Single-source report; awaiting corroboration.
At a recent UN meeting, progress in implementing the 2018 Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration was reviewed. UN Secretary-General António Guterres highlighted steps by member states to expand regular migration pathways, strengthen labour mobility, improve search and rescue, enhance data systems, and support safer return and reintegration. Despite these advances, major challenges remain, including the trafficking of at least 200,000 victims—mainly women and girls—over four years, and more than 15,000 migrant deaths or disappearances in just two years. Families and children continue to face detention, and many workers are still exploited and excluded from labour protections.
UN General Assembly President Annalena Baerbock emphasized that migration is an ongoing human reality and stressed the importance of managing it collaboratively, as countries are often origins, transit points, and destinations. She noted that migration is frequently politicized, with focus often on irregular movement and social welfare pressures, despite being a longstanding issue.
Advocates such as Natividad Obeso, representing migrants and refugees in Argentina, called for simpler and more humane regularisation processes. Obeso argued that migrant documentation should be an accessible right, not a privilege, since lack of documentation leads to detention, fear, and criminalization.
It was also noted that migrants make significant contributions worldwide, with remittances totaling about $1 trillion annually—more than combined official development assistance and foreign direct investment.