Liverpool defender Dejan Lovren has called on the world to do more regarding the refugee crisis and believes those having to flee their homes "deserve a chance" like the one he was given.
Lovren, 27, was a refugee himself as a child, with war forcing him and his family to leave his homeland of Bosnia for Germany.
"When I watch the news I see the refugees coming from Syria and other countries and my first instinct is always that we should give them a chance," Lovren, who was born to Croatian parents, told Joe.co.uk. "I know that there are concerns about terrorism and I understand that but these are families with kids, we can't just close our eyes.
"They deserve a chance like the one that me and my family were given when we left Bosnia. I will always be grateful to Germany for that. Germany gave us a safe haven, a place where we could be together as a family and I could grow up without fears about what might happen to me."
Lovren added that those critical of nations taking in refugees struggle to understand why people are forced to leave behind their homeland.
"It's impossible to understand unless you have been through it," Lovren said. "It's different when you watch on TV. That might make you uncomfortable as a human being because you know what is happening is bad and you know that people are suffering but you don't have the feeling of it.
"If more people had been through something like this they would be better able to understand because the most natural thing in the world is to want to protect your family and to keep them safe from harm.
"The people that we are seeing on TV now are fighting for their lives. They are refugees. They do not want to be part of a war, the war has been caused by someone else, and all they can do is try to escape from it. You want to live, you want a normal life and you want your kids to go to school -- that is why families like mine leave their home behind, that is why people become refugees."