Contributors

Sediqa Bakhtiari

Community Liaison

Sediqa Bakhtiari is from Afghanistan and relocated after the Taliban takeover of Kabul in 2021. Her personal experience as a refugee has fueled her passion for focusing on refugee studies. As part of her focus on refugee studies, Sediqa was a visiting fellow at the Refugee Studies Centre at the University of Oxford and is a research fellow at the Refugee-Led Research Hub, University of Oxford. She is also working with Refugee Education UK's research team, a charity working on providing education for refugee young people. Since 2022, she has collaborated with TSOS and currently serves as a community liaison.

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What would you do if you had to leave everything behind?

By the end of 2025, more than 117.8 million people worldwide had been forcibly displaced by war, persecution, or human rights abuses — and 45 million of them are children.

They arrive in refugee camps and countries seeking safety and carrying little: legal papers, if they're lucky. A backpack. A child's hand in theirs.

What they carry that we can't see is heavier: fractured families, homes they'll never return to, professions they loved, friends and relatives they may never see again.

In a climate where immigrant stories are often ignored or twisted, we believe stories are a form of justice. When someone shares what they survived, they reclaim their voice. When we amplify it through film, photography, and advocacy, the world listens. Hearts soften. Policy begins to shift.

Because when a lawmaker sees a person instead of a statistic, and a neighbor understands instead of fears, rebuilding becomes possible.

Your support helps us share these stories where they matter most.

— Kristen Smith Dayley, Executive Director, Their Story is Our Story

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