IPNEWS-Monrovia: Bayern Munich left-wing-back Alphonso Davies becomes the first footballer and first Canadian to take up a Global Goodwill Ambassador title for UNHCR, the UN refugee agency says.

Born in a refugee camp in Ghana, to Liberian🇱 parents who fled the civil war in their home country, Davies knows first-hand what it means to be a refugee: “Whilst the refugee camp provided a safe place for my family when they fled war, I often wonder where I would have been if I had stayed there and not benefited from the opportunities I got thanks to resettlement. I don’t think I would have made it to where I am today.”

Davies and his family were resettled to Canada when he was five. At 15, Davies began playing professional football and only a year later he had his national team debut, making him the youngest player ever on Canada’s Men’s National Team.

Flashback: Football fair play: Alphonso Davies being given a helping hand by former Barcelona magician, Leo Messi during a UEFA Champions League match in which Bayern walloped Barca, 8-2

Now at 21, Alphonso is keen to support the work of UNHCR and harness the power of sport to help those forced to flee to build a better future.

Davies becomes the second international football star with Liberian parents to be named as a Goodwill Ambassador for a UN Agency.

Liberian football icon, now president of Liberia became a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador in his heydays as a professional footballer when playing for Paris St. Germain and AC Milan respectively. As a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF, Weah used that opportunity to champion the disarmament process in Liberia following the end of Liberia’s 14 years civil war.

At point in time, Weah called for former Warlords who allegedly committed atrocities to be prosecuted in a War Crimes Court to give accounts of their respective deeds, with more than 250,000 Liberians dying as result of the civil upheaval.

But since he became president of Liberia, President George Weah and his government have reneged in establishing the War and Economic Crimes for Liberia, where warlords and other major rebel generals and their lieutenants who the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report indicted, will face justice.