World Refugee Day - Donegal and beyond

national | rights, freedoms and repression | news report Monday June 20, 2005 13:00 by Ruairi - SpunOut.ie info at spunout dot ie

Monday June 20th

There are almost 20 million refugees in the world today. They are people who are seeking refuge from wars, violence, oppression, poverty and famine. They flee their homelands to find safety and shelter elsewhere. They leave behind families, friends, their culture and their country in order to find what most of us take for granted - peace and safety.

To those in the government and elsewhere who say refugees and asylum seekers have no right to be in Ireland - this is nonsense. We all have a right to be safe and to have the right to live in peace. As the Irish economy grows, we must remember that much of our wealth has come from the resource rich continent of Africa where gold, oil, gas, copper, zinc and diamonds are plentiful. It is often the policies of rich countries that support the wars in Africa, which go on to create refugees who in turn come to places like Ireland to seek refuge.

Yesterday, the SpunOut.ie crew joined with the Donegal Town Failte Project and over 200 people to celebrate World Refugee Day with bands, drumming, dance, singing, speeches and a world food buffet. Below are some pics we took, including one of our own Conor O'Gara (SpunOut.ie music maniac) with his band Xperimental Shortcuts who were joined on stage by the great Steve Wickham of the Waterboys.

SpunOut.ie hopes to continue to draw attention to the plight of refugees in Ireland and across the world and is looking for people to join with our Take Action section by writing, interviewing and campaigning.

Also, we would like to say a big hello to our friend Moba from the Congo who is a refugee from the Congo. Moba was a great help in setting up SpunOut.ie when we worked with us between April and June 2004. He is now a Youth Development Worker in Dublin.