It is the obligation of every person born in a safer room to open the door when someone in danger knocks. – Dina Nayeri

Today marks World Refugee Day. It is a day dedicated to survivors: to people who faced and lived through all sorts of unimaginable horrors: war, torture, human trafficking, persecution for their sexual orientation.

People who, in search of a peaceful life and unable to access it safely, cross deserts in scorching heat and seas on boats that don’t even withstand calm weather.

People who, having fled from inhumane and degrading treatment, subsequently endure all manner of discrimination, including calls to go back to where they came from.

As I write this commemorative reflection, the EU’s interior ministers convene in Luxembourg to discuss ‘quotas’ and ‘burden-sharing’.

Not, as you might expect given these terms, in relation to financial affairs or the allocation of tasks in a work context, but rather, in relation to people, vulnerable people who cannot avail themselves of the protection of their own state.

I also read, elsewhere, that human rights are suffering a backlash all over the world.

It makes me think that perhaps we must make a case for them and for refugees, all over again: to remember why we felt the need, in the first place, to enact relevant laws that acknowledge our worth and dignity as human beings and that aim to protect us, among others, from persecution and from inhumane and degrading treatment: to remember why we even have a ‘World Refugee Day’ at all.

The international community formally recognised human rights not so long ago, in the aftermath of World War II. This was through the adoption by the United Nations of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights in 1948, which reads like poetry.

This was followed, in 1951, by the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees.

There must be a way of making more room in our societies for those who need it- Roxanne Meilak Borg

Both pieces of legislation, together with many other human rights instruments adopted around the same time, aimed to acknowledge, counteract and prevent the recurrence of the many atrocities that took place during the World War II, ultimately reflecting our collective responsibility towards each other as human beings.

Because we are all in this together. All of us, in some or way another, to varying extents, understand loss. All of us, in some way or another, to varying extents, have had our foundations shaken from beneath us.

We might be lucky enough not to understand what it means to flee our country and leave behind our home, our heritage and a familiar way of living. We might be lucky enough not to understand what it means to walk around in a new, foreign country with the label of ‘refugee’ hanging like a rain cloud above our heads, or imprinted on our chests in a scarlet ‘R’.

But we are all human beings. We all have a timeless need to belong. We would all want a safe haven – that is, international protection – for us, for our children, should we or they ever need it.

There must, therefore, be a way of making more room in our societies – dare I say, our hearts – for those who need it, even if we perceive them as different to us.

There must be a way, not only because we would wish to be warmly welcomed were we the ones fleeing persecution or war but also, above all, because we are all human beings, “born free and equal in dignity and rights”, and we are all in this together.

Roxanne Meilak Borg is a lawyer specialising in human rights and data protection law.