Refugee Week 2025: Finding Freedom – Diversity in Community

Refugee Week is Australia’s peak annual activity to promote greater awareness of refugees, the issues they face, and the contributions refugees are making to the Australian community.

To live without the fear of war, to have your basic human rights upheld, to live in equality and without the fear of persecution are just some of the examples of what freedom can entail. Every day millions of people across the world embark on dangerous journeys for the sole purpose of finding safety and freedom. From Australia to nations across the globe, settling into a new environment after experiencing the perils of a refugee’s journey can also provide the opportunity to live, to love and to dream.

Refugee Week runs from Sunday 15 June to Saturday 21 June.

Updated June 1, 2025
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Wyndham Library
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Across Mountains, Land and Sea: ; One Boy's Extraordinary Journey
Azadi, Arman.
Paper Book
Arman is just a boy when he is forced to leave his home and embark on the most extraordinary journey. Separated from family and friends, he travels across mountains, land and sea to find refuge. After encountering bandits, war and wolves, and surviving a hazardous boat crossing, he arrives at...
Cactus pear for my beloved
Sabawi, Samah
Paper Book
Samah Sabawi shares the story of her parents and many like them who were born as their parents were being forced to leave their homelands. Filled with love for land, history, peoples it is more than anything else a family story and a love story told with enormous humanity and feeling....
The crappiest refugee
Le, Hung
Paper Book
'One thing I really regret is that I can't hold a grown up, intellectual, spiritual conversation in my own language but I can order a meal in Vietnamese with an Australian accent. So embarrassment. What I regret most...is that I can't squat. Maybe the Minister Of Culture was right and I...
Freedom, only freedom : the prison writings of Behrouz Boochani
Boochani, Behrouz
Paper Book
Over six years of imprisonment in Australia's offshore migrant detention centre, the Kurdish-Iranian journalist and writer Behrouz Boochani bore personal witness to the suffering and degradation inflicted on him and his fellow refugees, culminating eventually in his prize-winning book - No Friend...
The happiest refugee : the extraordinary true story of a boy's journey from starvation at sea to becoming one of Australia's best-loved comedians
Do, Anh.
Digital file
The last million : Europe's displaced persons from World War to Cold War
Nasaw, David
Paper Book
After WWII, millions of lost and homeless POWs, slave labourers, political prisoners, and concentration camp survivors overwhelmed Germany. Soldiers attempted to repatriate them, but after exhaustive efforts there remained over a million displaced persons who had no home to which to return. The...
No friend but the mountains : writing from Manus prison
Boochani, Behrouz
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE VICTORIAN PREMIER''S LITERARY PRIZE FOR LITERATURE AND FOR NON-FICTION 2019 Where have I come from? From the land of rivers, the land of waterfalls, the land of ancient chants, the land of mountains... In 2013, Kurdish journalist Behrouz Boochani was illegally detained on Manus Island....
Nujeen : one girl's incredible journey from war-torn Syria in a wheelchair
Mustafa, Nujeen
Paper Book
Prize-winning journalist and the co-author of smash New York Times bestseller I Am Malala, Christina Lamb, now tells the inspiring true story of another remarkable young hero: Nujeen Mustafa, a teenager born with cerebral palsy, whose harrowing journey from war-ravaged Syria to Germany in a...
The pianist of Yarmouk
Ahmad, Aeham
Paper Book
One morning on the outskirts of Damascus, two starving friends are walking through their desolate city and come across a familiar street that has been turned to rubble, concrete bridges towering above them like tombs and houses turned inside out. Aeham turns to the only comfort he has left and sits...
The power of hope
Karapanagiotidis, Kon
Paper Book
A powerful, inspiring memoir from Kon Karapanagiotidis, founder of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, which argues that by putting community, love and compassion at the centre of our lives, we have the power to change our world. 'I hope you take from this book the message that we all...
Rebel : my escape from Saudi Arabia to freedom
Mohammed, Rahaf
Paper Book
In January 2019, then 18-year-old Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed escaped from her family while holidaying in Kuwait. She was fleeing systematic abuse of her human rights as a woman growing up in Saudi Arabia and, specifically, her family's threats to kill her because she desired the freedoms Western...
Run For Your Life: ; The remarkable true story of a family forced into hiding after leaking Russian secrets
Williams, Sue.
Paper Book
The remarkable true story of a family forced into hiding after leaking Russian secrets What started out as a great adventure turned into a terrifying nightmare when Nick Stride and his family were forced to flee for their lives from one of the richest, most powerful...
Safe Haven
Chandran, Shankari.
Paper Book
SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKPEOPLE FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR 2025 A SHAMELESS BOOK CLUB PICK AN AUSTRALIAN WOMEN'S WEEKLY GREAT READ 'A powerful, well-crafted story' -Sydney Morning Herald ...
A small town in Ukraine : the place we came from, the place we went back to
Wasserstein, Bernard
Paper Book
'A fine and deeply affecting work of history and memoir' Philippe Sands Decades ago, the historian Bernard Wasserstein set out to uncover the hidden past of the town forty miles west of Lviv where his family originated: Krakowiec (Krah-KOV-yets). In this book he...
Still alive notes from Australia's immigration detention system
Ahmed, Safdar
Paper Book
In early 2011, Safdar Ahmed visited Sydney's Villawood Immigration Detention Centre for the first time. He brought pencils and sketchbooks into the centre and started drawing with the people detained there. Their stories are told in this book.Interweaving journalism, history and autobiography, Still...
They cannot take the sky : stories from detention
Neville, Angelica
Paper Book
Revealing, moving and confronting accounts of the reality of life in mandatory detention by those who've experienced it.
The ungrateful refugee
Nayeri, Dina
Paper Book
A timely, provocative and personal examination of the refugee experience.
We are displaced : my journey and stories from refugee girls around the world
Yousafzai, Malala
Paper Book
What We Remember Will Be Saved : A Story of Refugees and the Things They Carry
Saldana, Stephanie
Paper Book
2023 Christopher Award Winner 2024 Excellence in Religion Reporting Award Winner for Nonfiction Eggplant seeds, a lullaby in a vanishing language, an embroidered dress. When people flee their homes, the things they save speak of beauty and suffering and the indomitable human spirit....

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