Asylum Welcome

🎓 Last month, five of our clients completed a Core Maths course at Oxford Lifelong Learning — the third in a series designed especially for displaced learners.

Huge thanks to Dr Ben Grant, Dr Tom Crawford and Behrad Ahmadpour at the University of Oxford.

lifelong-learning.ox.ac.uk/news/this-cl...

After years of fear and separation, Muhammad’s family is safe and reunited.

📖 Read their story: asylum-welcome.org/a-family-reu...

This is what welcome looks like - and what community can do. 🧡

Thank you for standing with refugees in Oxfordshire.

Tell your MP: Stand against the Refugee Citizenship Ban This Government has effectively banned refugees from ever becoming citizens. But we won’t stand for it!

🚨 There’s a debate in Parliament tomorrow about the refugee citizenship ban.
The UK is making it harder for refugees to become citizens—just because of how they arrived.
✍️ Write to your MP now (with thanks to our friends @freedomfromtorture.bsky.social):
secure.freedomfromtorture.org/page/173733/...

Refugee Week may be over — but the need remains.

Every day in Oxfordshire, people seek safety, food, shelter and family.

At Asylum Welcome, we offer essential support and expert advice when it’s needed most.

Please donate if you can:
app.donorfy.com/donate/9C307...

Thank you.

Today!
Sunday 22nd June 2025
12 noon: Rally at the Campsfield site (Langford Lane, Kidlington OX5 1RE)

1 mile walk to Kidlington Methodist Church; refreshments and discussions in the Rear Hall.

Let’s walk together to say: Keep Campsfield Closed.
Immigration detention is an abuse of human rights.

Illustration with the words "Community as a Superpower – Can you join us?" surrounded by comic-style yellow starbursts. Below are five smiling cartoon-style people of different ages, genders, and ethnic backgrounds, representing a diverse and welcoming community.

This #WorldRefugeeDay, we’re celebrating the strength it takes to start again – and the power of community to make it possible.

Your support helps refugees & asylum seekers in Oxfordshire find safety, dignity and a new beginning.

Please support our appeal today: tinyurl.com/RWBluesky25

Thank you.

Drop by our stall at the Sanctuary Fair and say hello! 💙

We’re here all afternoon at Oxford Town Hall sharing information about our work with refugees and asylum seekers in Oxfordshire.

#RefugeeWeek #CommunityAsSuperpower

#OxfordRefugeeWeek

Stand with us this #RefugeeWeek

Your donation today can help.

With your support, we can offer essentials like food, safe housing, and expert advice when it’s urgently needed.

Please give what you can to stand in solidarity with sanctuary seekers in our community.

👉 tinyurl.com/refugeeweeka...

Our theme this year for Refugee Week is 'Community as a Superpower'.

As bell hooks says “We can begin the process of making community wherever we are. We can begin by sharing a smile, a warm greeting, a bit of conversation; by doing a kind deed or by acknowledging kindness offered to us.”

By including Asylum Welcome in your Will, you can ensure that refugees and asylum seekers have the chance to live in dignity.

If Asylum Welcome has been part of your story—or the values you hold dear—please consider leaving a legacy of welcome

👉 www.asylum-welcome.org/legacy

Just 1 week to go until the Oxford Sanctuary Fair 2025!

*Book your free place (or just drop in):*
tinyurl.com/sanctuaryfair2025

*Part of Refugee Week*
Organised by Asylum Welcome, University of Oxford, Oxford Brookes, IWAW, Oxford City Council & more.

Sanctuary Wheels - giving free bikes for refugees & asylum seekers Since 2022 we have provided 600+ free bikes to refugees & asylum seekers across Oxfordshire. Bikes offer refugees the freedom to get to know their new homes, access vital services, medical appointment...

🚲 Happy #WorldBicycleDay from Sanctuary Wheels! 🧡

Since 2022, this project has provided hundreds of free refurbished bicycles to refugees and asylum seekers across Oxfordshire.

Each donated bike gets a second life — and offers someone the freedom they need to rebuild.
tinyurl.com/sanctuary-wh...

💥 Coming soon - #refugeeweek2025: Community as a Superpower

🗓 16–22 June

*🧡 Planning an event?
We’d love to include it in the Oxford Refugee Week brochure.
Submit by 12 noon on Friday 6th June:
👉https://tinyurl.com/RW2025programme

📧 emma@asylum-welcome.org
🌐 oxfordrefugeeweek.info

If your organisation can help promote this model, influence decision-makers, or support its future, please share it.
👉 Read the full evaluation report: tinyurl.com/nrpf-project...
👉 Read the executive summary: tinyurl.com/nrpf-summary

We are looking for new trustees! - Asylum Welcome We are looking for two new trustees to join our board - a treasurer and a trustee with lived experience.

📣 We're looking for two new trustees to help guide the future of Asylum Welcome:

💼 Treasurer
🌍 Trustee with lived experience

Help stand up for refugee rights here in Oxfordshire. #NeighboursNotStrangers

Read more on our website:
🔗 www.asylum-welcome.org/trustee-recr...

Apply by Friday 30th May.

A huge thank you to everyone who helped make our recent Eid and Easter celebration at Sandford Village Hall such a joyful success! 🙏
If you’re interested in getting involved or hosting an event for Refugee Week, reach out to us at development@asylum-welcome.org 📩

Jonny's fundraiser for Asylum Welcome Youth Club and Oxford Phoenix FC Help Jonny Fox raise money to support Asylum Welcome

Our brilliant volunteer Jonny Fox is running the Oxford Town & Gown 10k on 11th May in aid of Asylum Welcome and Oxford Phoenix FC. 🐦‍🔥

Help keep it running by supporting Jonny’s run! 🙏

👉 Donate here: www.justgiving.com/page/jonny-f...

The Asylum Welcome family said a huge thank you and a fond farewell to our outgoing Director, Mark. Mark's has guided AW through times of change and growth. Thanks to Mark we're stronger and better prepared for whatever the future holds. We'd also like to welcome our new Joint CEOs, Hari and Sarah!

🌟 We're hiring! 🌟

Asylum Welcome is seeking a part-time Trust and Foundations Fundraiser to support refugees and asylum seekers in Oxfordshire. 🧡

⏳ Closes Monday 5th May at midnight
💡 Have someone in mind? Please help by spreading the word!

For more details:
www.asylum-welcome.org/trust-fundra...

Please donate and help more people like Hira rebuild their lives!

"Art gives us the ability to meet people halfway."

Please give what you can today to ensure we can continue this vital work.

www.asylum-welcome.org/spring-appea...

In a difficult economic landscape and with the government trying hard to reduce its spending, Asylum Welcome is struggling to raise funds to support those stuck in the asylum system.

Click the link below to donate and to read more about Mohamed!

www.asylum-welcome.org/spring-appea...

✨If you are LGBTQI+, in the UK and have experience of asylum or detention, or applying for a partner/spouse visa, we want to hear from you!

There are many ways to get involved.

💻Please email us at hello@rainbowmigration.org.uk if you're interested, and share this with anyone you know who might be.

Barges, disused army barracks, hotels—none of these are fit for people to live in, and only add to the trauma of those already suffering. Wethersfield, like other temporary sites, must close. It's time for real solutions: community-based housing, support, and dignity for those seeking sanctuary.

Labour wants to reopen a controversial refugee detention centre - but people are fighting back Yvette Cooper announced Labour was not only pressing ahead with reopening Campsfield House, but also had plans to expand it

Home Office held 19,000 people in immigration detention centres in year to March 2024, many of whom had experienced torture, oppression, & trauma, & are extremely vulnerable.

Britain is the only country in Europe to have no upper limit on time a person can be detained

@asylumwelcome.bsky.social

Above: a story about how tougher immigration controls create opportunities for exploitation.

Below: a story about how the government says it will reduce exploitation through tougher immigration controls.

From Guardian: Yvette Cooper reviews right to family life for people who enter UK irregularly Government looks at use of human rights law to argue for people being allowed to stay, which PM called a ‘loophole’ Ministers are reviewing how international human rights law is being applied to allow people to stay in the UK after entering by irregular means, Yvette Cooper has said. The home secretary said on Sunday she was looking into the implementation of article eight of the Human Rights Act, which protects the right to a family life and has been used by people to argue for their right to stay in the UK. [Highlighted paragraph] The review is one of a range of actions Cooper is taking as she tries to bring down the record numbers of people crossing the Channel in small boats.

Your reminder that the right or otherwise of children in the UK to live with their non-British parents has exactly the square root of sod all to do with people arriving by small boat, so apart from anything else this really is not very honest politics

(link to source in next post)

That isn't something to be proud of

‘It means death’: Afghan women’s rights activists face deportation from Pakistan Police go door-to-door arresting Afghans as government pledges to send millions back home to Taliban rule

The UK, and others, need to stop focusing on preventing people from seeking asylum and step up to ensure that they have safer and simpler means to do so. They must not stand by and watch people be sent back to Afghanistan. It is tantamount to a death sentence.

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

✨ Today is both Eid al-Fitr and #MothersDay.

For many we support, joy is mixed with longing—families divided by war, borders, or exile.

To everyone facing this day with mixed emotions: we see you.

May there come a day when no one is forced to celebrate alone.

#ReuniteRefugeeFamilies #EidMubarak