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Welcome to the latest edition of Action Matters. This online bulletin will keep you up to date with the ways in which Refugee Action and its supporters and volunteers respond to and influence public debate, and ensure that refugees' voices are heard.

With your help, we do make a difference.

Zimbabwean asylum seekers still in limbo

Two weeks in Parliament Square

Are you aged between 14 and 21?

Thank you, runners!

FACT OF THE MONTH

Refugee Action/Claudia Janke Nearly half of Brits have a refugee link! 40% of people living in the UK today have links with Huguenot refugees who fled here in the 1600s.

The BBC show, ‘Who do you think you are?’ recently uncovered the story of talk show host Jerry Springer’s refugee roots. His family had to flee from Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

Mayor of London Boris Johnson’s family tree also revealed a dramatic escape from persecution – his great grandfather was a controversial journalist in Turkey and had to flee from death threats.

Keep an eye on the series to find out about other celebs with a refugee heritage.

Zimbabwean asylum seekers still in limbo – no action from government.

Over the summer, there has been mounting pressure on the government to give 11,000 Zimbabwean asylum seekers who have not been granted refugee status the temporary right to stay and support themselves in the UK.

Despite this pressure, including calls from Zimbabwe March/London Citizens Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, and a march of over 1,000 people in Westminster, the Home Office continues to leave Zimbabweans in limbo. Zimbabweans are not being deported, but refused asylum seekers are still expected to return voluntarily. Unless they sign to say that they are prepared to do so, they receive no support at all – and have no right to work to support themselves.

This demonstrates outrageous inconsistency within the government, when the UK’s own foreign office has condemned the Mugabe regime.

If you think that this needs to be put right, you could:

write to the Prime Minister (as you may have heard, Mr Brown sometimes phones letter-writers – you never know if you’ll be the next recipient of an early morning phone call!)
Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP
10 Downing Street
London
SW1 2A4
write to your local paper highlighting the issue

When a Zimbabwean in this situation was recently brought before the courts for obtaining a fake passport in order that he could work and support his family, the judge said that he was an “entirely decent hard working and law-abiding” honourable man forced into an illegal act by impossible circumstances: [he] cannot go home and [has] to do what [he] can to try and stay alive."

We believe it is a moral failure to force Zimbabweans, fleeing a country which is experiencing extraordinary levels of human rights abuse, into destitution in an attempt to make them return.

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Two weeks in Parliament Square

From 29 September to 12 October, two supporters of the Still Human Still Here campaign will be sleeping in Parliament Square, Westminster, campaigning to end the destitution of refused asylum seekers.

Ben and Ben (the protest men – their words, not ours) are outraged by the current situation and want to draw attention to it in the media, and among MPs.

They invite you to join them – for a chat, for a Parliament Square meal, for a night, for a prayer. Even if you can’t make it to London, why not add a comment to their blog to encourage them?

Calling young campaigners!

Are you between 14 and 21?

Do you want the campaign for dignity and respect for asylum seekers to reach a wider audience?

A new Channel 4 show could give you just the chance you need.

Battlefront is a new show featuring 20 campaigns run by young campaigners. They have selected 19 – and are looking out for a 20th.

This is a fantastic opportunity to increase the profile of the campaign to end the destitution of asylum seekers among young people.

They say “By joining the battlefront team you’ll get to take your campaign out to the masses with the help of top industry experts and specialist mentors. You’ll get a profile on the Battlefront website and if you’re really good you could be featured in the Channel 4 TV series. If you’re aged 14-21, have a top idea and have the motivation to run a campaign for at least 6 months, we want to know about it. Entries must be submitted by 1st October 2008.”

We’d love it if somebody took up this opportunity and would be happy to chat through your proposal with you.

Thank you, runners!

Refugee Action/Disha Sughand Congratulations and a massive thank you to the six runners who took part in the Adidas Women's 5K Challenge on Sunday 7th September and raised over £2,200 for Refugee Action.