At the 2024 Olympic Games, the IOC’s Olympic Refugee Team featured 36 athletes from 11 different countries of origin, competing in 12 different sports. It was the team’s third appearance at the Games, after making its debut in Rio in 2016. Back then, there were close to 60 million displaced people globally. On the eve of Paris 2024, that number had soared to over 100 million. But while there is a tendency to distil the topic of refugees and immigration to faceless numbers and dispassionate data, each statistic has a human story behind it. You’ll hear a couple of those in this episode. Athletes like Matin Balsini and Dorsa Yavarivafa share their painful experiences and emotional journeys in finding a new home in the UK, and the stories of their successful route to the Olympics in Paris.