Another milestone achieved by Europe's greatest club, after successes with Unicef and UNESCO.


History was made today as FC Barcelona and ACNUR signed a collaboration agreement in Geneva today for a three-year period. The first refugee action programmes involving Barça will be applied in Rwanda, Nepal and Ecuador. The agreement will be in place, in principle, for three years, and the first 12 months will be focused on Rwanda, Nepal and Ecuador, three countries that host thousands of refugees from other territories. The president of FC Barcelona, Joan Laporta, and the High Commissioner of UNHCR/ACNUR, António Guterres, signed an agreement at midday today by which the football club will be adapting some of the Foundation’s programmes to different refugee camps in different parts of the world. The agreement was signed at the UNHCR/ACNUR headquarters in Geneva. According to Joan Laporta, who spoke after the signing, the Barca president said that:

This is further evidence of Barça’s commitments. This is our next big challenge. We are ready to score lots of goals.
Yet again, we are sending a message to the world, but as always, it is not just a message. It is also about actions.

In response, the ACNUR high commissioner, António Guterres thanked FC Barcelona and was clearly happy with the resolve and philosophy of the Catalan clubside. Guterres outlined the importance of the agreement when he said:

We believe Barça will open a lot of doors for us in order to make society understand about the plight of refugees. FC Barcelona and its Foundation have a high capacity for communication. Associating sport with education is a formidable thing.