The President, Mrs McAleese, was yesterday presented with a booklet containing the stories of 10 refugees who have settled in Ireland during the past 50 years. Ms Fardus Sultan (23), a Bosnian refugee who came to Ireland in 1993, made the presentation at the closing ceremony for the European Year Against Racism at Dublin Castle.
The introduction to the booklet, A Part of Ireland Now, was written by the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, who praised the contribution which these refugees had made to Irish society.
Mr Ahern said Ireland was now becoming increasingly diverse and he hoped the booklet would help Irish people appreciate the ordeals of those who have fled persecution in their own countries.
"In modern Europe, discrimination against others on grounds of race has no place. Instead, we must celebrate our cultural diversity and continue in the fight against racism."
The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, yesterday announced the payment of grants totalling £5,000 for the Year Against Racism projects. The Refugee Agency has been given £3,000 to assist with the publication of the booklet, while the National Union of Journalists has received £2,000 towards a conference on racism, to be held in Dublin in February.
Among the stories told in the booklet, which was compiled by Irish Times journalist Andy Pollak, is that of Ms Sabine Shorts. She escaped from a Jewish ghetto in Warsaw in 1938 with the aid of a fabricated letter from her father, who had already reached safety in Ireland.
Her mother, meanwhile, was one of thousands who met their deaths after the Nazis took over the ghetto and her sister was murdered in a concentration camp.
Arriving in Ireland with a four-week visa to visit her father, she managed to stay when an official, who was meant to put her on a train to Belfast, took pity on her and pretended he had seen her leaving the State.
Mrs Shorts is currently writing the story of her flight from Berlin and her discovery of a sanctuary in Ireland.
Bosnian refugee Ms Zlata Filipovic (16) came to Dublin two years ago, where she had obtained a place to study at St Andrew's School in Blackrock, Dublin, but she was not an ordinary student.
Her diary of life in Sarajevo between 1991 and 1993 was first published in Sarajevo and then translated into French, before becoming a bestseller.