Ac­cord­ing to the Unit­ed Na­tions Com­mis­sion­er for Refugees [UN­HCR], the an­nu­al com­mem­o­ra­tion of World Refugee Day on June 20 recog­nis­es the strength, courage, and de­ter­mi­na­tion of peo­ple who have been ‘forced to flee their home coun­try to es­cape con­flict and per­se­cu­tion’. https://www.un­hcr.org/get-in­volved/take-ac­tion/world-refugee-day. In 2001, the Unit­ed Na­tions Gen­er­al As­sem­bly an­nounced the com­mem­o­ra­tion of World Refugee Day on June 20 in recog­ni­tion of the 50th an­niver­sary of the 1951 Con­ven­tion Re­lat­ing to the Sta­tus of Refugees. https://www.un­hcr.org/get-in­volved/take-ac­tion/world-refugee-day

The 2025 theme is “Sol­i­dar­i­ty with Refugees”, which, ac­cord­ing to the UN­HCR, “sol­i­dar­i­ty means say­ing, clear­ly and coura­geous­ly, that refugees are not alone and that we will not turn our backs.”

What role can sport play in pro­mot­ing sol­i­dar­i­ty with refugees? Sport pro­vides refugees with an op­por­tu­ni­ty to start anew while fos­ter­ing so­cial in­volve­ment and sol­i­dar­i­ty with­in the com­mu­ni­ty. The Refugee Olympic Team, which com­pet­ed in the Paris Olympics 2024, con­sist­ed of 37 ath­letes from eleven [11] coun­tries who par­tic­i­pat­ed in twelve [12] dif­fer­ent sports. Through their par­tic­i­pa­tion, they dis­played both their ath­let­ic abil­i­ties and in­spi­ra­tion among dis­placed in­di­vid­u­als. Some of the ath­letes were Ad­nan Khankan [orig­i­nal­ly from Syr­ia], who com­pet­ed in ju­do; Cindy Ngam­ba [orig­i­nal­ly from Cameroon], who com­pet­ed in box­ing; Lu­na Solomon [orig­i­nal­ly from Er­itrea], who com­pet­ed in shoot­ing; Farzad Man­souri [orig­i­nal­ly from Afghanistan], who com­pet­ed in taek­won­do; and Fran­cis­co Edilio Cen­teno Nieves [orig­i­nal­ly from Venezuela], who com­pet­ed in shoot­ing.

The In­te­gra­tion of In­te­gra­tion of Refugees through Sport [IRTS] is a net­work of or­gan­i­sa­tions across Eu­rope, aimed at “em­pow­er­ing peo­ple work­ing or vol­un­teer­ing in the in­te­gra­tion of refugees through sports roles by of­fer­ing in-per­son and on­line op­por­tu­ni­ties to meet, learn, gain recog­ni­tion for their ini­tia­tives and con­nect with high-pro­file hu­man­i­tar­i­an or­gan­i­sa­tions.” https://irts.is­ca.org/.

Malmö FF foot­ball club in 2021 an­nounced an in­crease in em­ploy­ment op­por­tu­ni­ties by promis­ing to em­ploy 50 refugees in their Food and Ser­vice Or­gan­i­sa­tion by 2023. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, Malmö FF, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the City of Malmö, agreed to “pro­vide op­por­tu­ni­ties for refugee chil­dren and youth to par­tic­i­pate in the ‘Equal val­ue for all/School foot­ball against racism’ ac­tiv­i­ties.”

Oltalom Sport As­so­ci­a­tion (Hun­gary): Ac­cord­ing to pro­gramme co­or­di­na­tor and so­cial work­er at the Oltalom Sports As­so­ci­a­tion, Do­ra Gottgeisl, the or­gan­i­sa­tion “us­es sport, and more specif­i­cal­ly foot­ball, to fos­ter so­cial in­clu­sion of mar­gin­alised and at-risk groups, which in­cludes refugees and mi­grants re­sid­ing in Hun­gary. We work with the be­lief that if the ma­jor­i­ty of so­ci­ety have the chance to see and ex­pe­ri­ence peers from mi­nor­i­ty groups in dif­fer­ent roles than main­stream me­dia con­vey, it can con­tribute to chang­ing peo­ple’s mind­sets. Pos­i­tive ex­pe­ri­ences can turn in­to changes in at­ti­tudes, which will find a way in­to every­day life sit­u­a­tions.” https://irts.is­ca.org/up­date/1006/pos­i­tive-ex­pe­ri­ences-can-turn-in­to-changes-in-at­ti­tudes-oltalom-sport-as­so­ci­a­tion.

Sports have con­tributed to pro­mot­ing so­cial in­te­gra­tion and men­tal health among refugees [Ki­raly, 2024]. Par­tic­i­pat­ing in sports of­fers refugees the op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­duce stress, form so­cial bonds, and ac­quire es­sen­tial life skills. For ex­am­ple, it has been de­ter­mined that com­mu­ni­ty-dri­ven sport­ing events, such as the Am­s­ter­dam Fut­sal Tour­na­ment, are suc­cess­ful venues for cul­tur­al in­te­gra­tion and sus­tain­abil­i­ty, pro­vid­ing mi­grants with a sense of pur­pose and be­long­ing. https://irts.is­ca.org/glob­alirts-re­sources.

How­ev­er, ac­cess to sports pro­gram­ming is not with­out its dif­fi­cul­ties. Refugees’ en­gage­ment may be hin­dered by ob­sta­cles such as dis­crim­i­na­tion, cul­tur­al bar­ri­ers, and prac­ti­cal dif­fi­cul­ties. Sport can serve as a space for so­cial in­te­gra­tion, but to achieve its de­sired goals and out­comes, pro­grammes must be in­clu­sive and con­sid­er­ate of the di­verse needs of refugees, ac­cord­ing to a meta-syn­the­sis of qual­i­ta­tive re­search [Schinke, 2020].

As we ob­serve World Refugee Day on June 20, 2025, it is es­sen­tial to recog­nise the po­ten­tial of sport in pro­mot­ing in­clu­sion, em­pow­er­ment, and in­te­gra­tion in so­ci­ety. Sport ex­em­pli­fies the for­ti­tude and re­silience of in­di­vid­u­als who have been forcibly up­root­ed. By adopt­ing the theme of “Sol­i­dar­i­ty with Refugees”, we reaf­firm our shared oblig­a­tion to sup­port and em­pow­er those who have been forced to leave their homes.