17 June 2021
This Sunday, June 20, is World Refugee Day, a day the UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency, says celebrates the strength and courage of people who have been forced to flee their home country to escape conflict or persecution. World Refugee Day is an occasion to build empathy and understanding for their plight and to recognise their resilience in rebuilding their lives.
With regards to refugees and asylum seekers, it is the ANMF’s view that:
- As an advanced and civil society, Australia has a moral and legal obligation to treat every human being compassionately and with respect, courtesy and consideration.
- The Australian Government has a responsibility to use language appropriately to avoid labelling, negative imagery and racist remarks that incite fear and division within the community.
Afterall, there have been some pretty famous, influential folk who came from a refugee background, many of whom have contributed greatly to their adopted homeland.
Here’s just a few:
Anh Do – The popular author, painter and comedian arrived in Australia on a small fishing boat, aged three, with dozens of other Vietnamese refugees, having fled their war-torn country.
Karl Kruszelnicki – Born in Sweden, the Australian science personality’s Polish parents were both Holocaust survivors. Dr Karl’s mother escaped the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp after the Nazis ran out of Zyklon B, a cyanide-based pesticide that was used to gas prisoners.
Freddie Mercury – Lead singer of the band Queen. His family escaped to England in 1964 after a violent revolution rocked the island of Zanzibar, where Freddie was born.
Rita Ora – The singer came to the UK as an infant refugee from Kosovo.
Gloria Estefan – The pop star fled Cuba as a child after Fidel Castro came to power. Her father had been a bodyguard for the preceding president.
Georg Ritter von Trapp – Father of the Trapp family, whose story inspired The Sound of Music after fleeing Nazi-occupied Austria.
Madeleine Albright – Former US Secretary of State. Her family fled Prague for England during World War II and later fled Prague again, this time headed for the US, after the Communists took power.
Sigmund Freud – An Austrian Jew who founded psychoanalysis, Freud fled from the Nazis in Austria, settling in the UK.
Max Born – Winner of the Nobel Prize for physics, a German-Jewish refugee and grandfather of singer Olivia Newton-John.
Albert Einstein – One of the world’s most famous scientists, also a German-Jewish refugee.
Gene Simmons – Member of rock band KISS, Simmons’ mother was a Holocaust survivor.
Jackie Chan – Fled to the US from Hong Kong after being threatened with death by the Triads.
Mila Kunis – Her family left Soviet Ukraine during the Cold War when the actress was just 7 years old, resettling in the US.
Ben Elton – Comedian and grandson of a Czechoslovakian refugee.
This year’s World Refugee Day theme is ‘Together we heal, learn and shine’, with the UNHCR appealing for donations to improve resources and fund education scholarships for refugees. Click here to find out more.
Further to the aforementioned policies, the ANMF also believes:
- The Australian migration system should be responsive to the needs of people who live in societies where an oppressive regime, and/or armed conflict force them to be displaced and seek asylum, or who live in underdeveloped countries struggling with poverty, famine and environmental disasters.
- While their application is being processed, people seeking asylum in Australia should receive treatment which is consistent and humane, regardless of how they entered Australia or country of origin.
- Children must not be detained and must be released swiftly with their principal care giver (or with appropriate foster care arrangements if unaccompanied and with no relatives in Australia) into the Australian community.
- The use of offshore detention centres for the housing and detention of unauthorised individuals seeking asylum is not supported.
Sources include: https://refugeeweek.org.uk/resources/facts-figures-and-contributions/famous-refugees/