Friendship at 13,000 feet: how climbing in the Swiss Alps is bringing refugees together

Mountain guide Jérôme Henchoz leads a group of hikers with Peaks4All to the first pass on Ulrichshorn in Switzerland. Photograph: Simon Straetker

At 4,000 metres, conditions can be challenging. The air is thin, movement takes effort, and the ice and snow demand proper gear: warm layers, crampons, an ice axe, ropes for crossing glaciers.

Yet a group of refugees in Switzerland – from Afghanistan, Iran, Palestine, Ukraine and elsewhere – say this is exactly where they have found freedom, calm and even respite from the trauma of war, political persecution and imprisonment.