UNHCR launches billboard campaign to combat anti-immigration voices

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is launching a billboard campaign to mark World Refugee Day on 20 June, hirado.hu reported.

In its statement concerning the launch of the campaign, the international organisation writes that the four different billboards, which are to be posted in the stations of metro lines 2 and 3 in Budapest, depict refugees living in Hungary who contributed to the development of the country.

With its billboard campaign, the organisation wishes to mirror the image of the government’s anti-immigration billboard campaign, which has been at the centre of Hungarian public discourse in the past few weeks. However, UNHCR claims that the timing is a mere coincidence.

Picture 1

The UNHCR billboards feature a restaurant owner from Bangladesh

“We want to live here, this is why we opened our restaurant”

Picture 2

A nursery worker from Togo

“Children are full of love, they do not have preconceptions”

Picture 3

A tour guide and self-confessed fan of the Hungarian poet and national hero Sándor Petõfi from Afghanistan