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Call to stop demonising selected groups in society

HONG KONG (SE): A study carried out by the Department of Cultural Studies at the Lingnan University in Fu Tei shows that some reporting on refugees or asylum seekers in Hong Kong is highly biased.
 
A forum organised by the university and the Justice and Peace Commission held at the Living Faith Society Limited in Talentum Bookshop in Yau Ma Tei on August 6 urged people to view reports on refugees or asylum seekers with caution.
 
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Japanese warrior for refugees mourned

TOKYO (UCAN): Michiko Inukai, a nationally-known Catholic author who supported refugees in Japan and abroad, died on July 24 due to advanced age. She was 96.
 
Inukai was a granddaughter of the prime minister, Tsuyoshi Inukai, whose assassination by young naval officers in 1932 marked the end of effective civilian control of the Japanese government until after World War II.
 
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Priest asks China for mercy on North Korean refugees

SEOUL (SE): Father Philippe Blot, who has spent many years working with North Korean refugees in China, said that conditions have worsened for surviving Christians under the dictatorship of Kim Jong-un and he is urging Beijing to give shelter to fugitives crossing into China from the hermit kingdom.

The National Catholic Reporter said on April 4 that Father Blot, a volunteer with the Paris Foreign Mission Society, describes the situation facing North Korean refugees as becoming ever more dramatic as they flee to China to avoid dying of hunger.
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An opening given to the Rohingya

KUALA LUMPUR (AsiaNews): The Malaysian government has become one of the first to introduce a skills training programme for the Rohingya people who have fled persecution in the Union of Myanmar and failed to find a welcome in Bangladesh or Thailand.

The programme is aimed at turning out semi-skilled workers that can be absorbed into the country’s labour market. It will also normalise their status in the country in order to give them the protection of labour legislation.
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Challenge to be generous with wealth

February 8 is the feast of St. Josephine Bakhita. At her canonisation in 2000, Pope John Paul II said that in the life of the former slave, we find a shining advocate of genuine emancipation, a life that inspires not passive acceptance, but firm resolve to work effectively to return those deprived of their rights to true freedom.

On 30 November 2007, Pope Benedict XVI wrote in In Hope We are Saved (Spe Salvi) a summary of her entire life as an outstanding example of Christian hope.







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It is Muslims that welcome refugees

It is truly an age of disbelief. Respect for the values of human life has plunged. The number of people of Christian faith, who declare belief in the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth that upholds the dignity and rights of the human person, stand with the poor and the excluded, share with the refugees and the homeless, is at an all-time low.







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Something does not love a wall in Calais

LONDON (SE): When on 26 June 1963 the then-president of the United States of America, John Kennedy, quoted Robert Frost as saying, “Something there is that does not love a wall,” while standing before the concrete divide of East and West Berlin, he touched a deep chord in people’s hearts.
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Refugees and the Olympic spirit

RIO DE JANEIRO (SE): “I extend my greetings and wish you success at the Olympic Games in Rio—that your courage and strength find expression through the Olympic Games and serve as a cry for peace and solidarity,” Pope Francis wrote in a letter addressed to each one of the 14 members of the first ever team to represent, not a country, but a people with no soil of their own on which to place their feet.
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Meal of Love a welcome for torture claimants

HONG KONG (UCAN): Every two months people from the parish of Ss. Peter and Paul at Yuen Long gather together with a group of torture claimants for a shared at the high school campus that adjoins the church compound.

Hosted by the parish and the St. Vincent de Paul Society, what has been dubbed the Meal of Love is intended to break down the barriers that exist between Hong Kong locals and those seeking refuge in the city, who mostly come from southeast Asia and Africa.
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Refugees are our neighbours

HONG KONG (SE): A campaign to support refugees and torture claimants in Hong Kong organised by the ad hoc committee of the Jubilee of Mercy and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul is underway.

An information afternoon was held at the Diocese Centre on May 21 in which the president of the ad hoc committee of the Jubilee of Mercy, Bishop Joseph Ha Chi-shing, stated that taking care of our neighbours is what Christians should do.
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