Information - New Horizon Athlone

Drop in for a Chat

Are you free for half an hour on Tuesday evenings? We are restarting our regular drop in clinics, this time online. Drop in for a…

Gerry Callaghan 2021-03-14

A Guide to the International Protection Procedure

United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) have just published a guide to the International Protection Procedure in Ireland. It’s available in the following 20…

Gerry Callaghan 2021-03-03

Changes to Right to Work

The department of Justice has made changes to the right to work last week: People seeking international protection can now apply to access the labour…

Gerry Callaghan 2021-02-04

Cork leads way with refugee work agency

The wealth of experience and talent in the refugee and asylum-seeker community has been recognised by an innovative venture in Cork. Led by Roos Demol,…

Angela 2020-11-30

The Forest Experience

We are planning a project with a difference! New Horizon plans to set up a forest experience for about twenty children living on the Lissywollen…

Gerry Callaghan 2020-11-16

Limerick integration project gets funding

A project to integrate refugees and asylum-seekers into local communities has won €9,000 in European Union funding. Called ReStart, it is run by the Enactus…

Angela 2020-11-16

IMPORTANT NOTICE: COVID-19 restrictions from October 22

Update from the IPO: All substantive protection interviews are cancelled from Thursday 22 October 2020 until further notice. “Please find below a copy of…

Gerry Callaghan 2020-10-21

Online Drop-in Clinic

Because of the virus shutdown I’ve been exploring how to run online meetings as an alternative to person-to-person contact. This would allow New Horizon to…

Gerry Callaghan 2020-03-17

We are a front line refugee support group mainly working on the Lissywollen Direct Provision site in Athlone. Our focus is on providing information and help to the 300 (on average) residents living there.

We also work on the Temple Direct Provision site in Horseleap, Moate.

Everyone in the DP sites in Athlone and Temple is what is described as a ‘Convention’ refugee. People who have arrived in Ireland under a United Nations resettlement program are known as ‘Programme’ refugees.

Convention refugees are people who have made their own way to Ireland and have applied for recognition of refugee status when they arrive.

Various official and unofficial routes and methods are used to travel to Ireland. These change continually, depending on weather conditions and enforcement levels at crossings.

On arrival people are normally housed for a few weeks in Baleskin, near Dublin airport. They are then dispersed to various direct provision centres around the country.

People can get protection if they meet the conditions set out in The United Nations Convention on Protection of Refugees.

See Definition of a Refugee