UN chief says nations must make more safe options for refugees, recalls losing own home as boy

DUBLIN – U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appealed to the world to find new ways to provide shelter to refugees. People like him.

Speaking Monday to a group of Afghan, Syrian and other war refugees in Ireland, the U.N. chief recalled his family's Korean War escape.

Ban said: "One of my earliest memories is fleeing with my family into the hills surrounding my village. As we climbed in the rain, I looked back on the only world I knew: where I had played, where I had gone to school, where I had lived with my family. All of it was in flames."

"I know at least some measure of what you are going through," he told the refugees.

Ban says nations must create more safe routes for migrants to use.