UN General Assembly
1989

In particular we believe that the United Nations should undertake a direct and comprehensive examination of the plight of millions of people in the developing world who because of poverty and hunger are obliged to risk their very lives seeking to meet the bare necessities for survival in foreign countries. For the most part the exodus is from one developing country to another. These people fall between the cracks of the Office of the united nations High Commissioner for Refugees and migrant-worker agreements. The assistance afforded to political refugees is not available to those migrating for economic reasons. Neither can the countries in which they arrive look to the international community to alleviate the economic and social burdens which such migration imposes. There is an urgent need for the international community to address this critical issue. To the extent possible the international development strategy for the fourth United Nations Development Decade should contain concrete co-operative measures to assist those obliged to migrate for economic reasons and those developing countries which must confront this problem.