Kirkcaldy Centre hive of activity for International Migrants Day

International Migrants Day is a global event that aims to celebrate the contributions made by the roughly 272 million migrants worldwide, including more than 41 million internally displaced persons and to highlight the challenges they face.

On December 18, 1990, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution on the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, this resolution is a United Nations multilateral treaty governing the protection of migrant workers and families.

Each year on December 18, the United Nations, through the UN-related agency International Organization for Migration, uses International Migrants Day to examine a wide range of migration themes, social cohesion, dignity, exploitation and solidarity to advocate for migration guided by the principle that humane and orderly migration benefits migrants and society.

Justyna Majewska, manager at the Fife Migrants Forum, highlights the positive effects that migration has on our communities, she said: “International Migrants day is about shouting out about migrants in Fife, particularly here in Kirkcaldy where Fife Migrants is based.

“We help every single person that comes through our doors, and help to resolve different issues, but this day today is all about integration into Scottish society.

“We want to show the best of our migrants in Scotland by showing some of their crafts and arts.

“We also had a art competition for children called Scotland my home, which had a really good response, with the childrens artwork being displayed in our units here at the forum.

As well as arts and crafts on display, there was a whole host of international food for sale and various other services that migrants in Fife offer.

Justyna goes on to explain how integration benefits everyone in the community, she said: “Today we are celebrating integration and migration because it is good for the local economy to share different things in the community.

“We hope that migrants will be appreciated here in Scotland, we have had a great response from politicians and also from other communities that they are really happy to have migrants here in Kirkcaldy.”

Councillor Rod Cavanagh also attended the event last week and welcomed migrants to Fife, he said: “I’m happy to support International Migrants Day, migrants make a valuable contribution to the economy of Fife.

“Fife welcomes migrants, we welcome the way migrants actively integrate with society here.”

Auxi Sousa, project support officer with the Fife Migrants Forum, said: “With International Migrants day we are celebrating migration, we are celebrating different cultures, diversity and we are also celebrating us.

“We are having fun together and we have a lot of stalls from different countries promoting diversity, this is really important in the times that we are in right now to make us visible to people in the country.”