Suleiman Ali is not your typical 'Galway Profile'. For one thing, he's not from Galway.

Suleiman Ali has only lived here for six months, and has only been in Ireland a little over two years. But he's one of a growing number of people who have come to this city to find work, education, or, indeed, a refuge.

Suleiman is from the war-torn region of Darfur in Sudan. A devout Muslim, he refuses a cup of coffee because it is Ramadan and he's fasting. I feel a little guilty drinking mine, especially when he tells me he loves sugar, because it's something new to him since he moved to Ireland.

Suleiman came to Ireland, via Libya, in 2006. He had to pay traffickers to escape Darfur, where his village had been attacked by the Sudanese Government-backed Janjaweed militia, but managed to arrive in Dublin as an asylum seeker.

His wife remains in a refugee camp in Chad, where he says "she's OK", but he misses her. There is plenty of food at the refugee camp, he says, which is manned by aid workers, some of them Irish.

"Irish Aid is very famous in my country," he says. Irish Aid is the development wing of the Department of Foreign Affairs, and funds projects all over the developing world, including emergency projects such as refugee assistance in Chad.

It was almost two years before Suleiman attained refugee status, during which he lived in Donegal and in Ballyhaunis, Co. Mayo. A day trip from the refugee centre in Ballyhaunis was the beginning of his attraction to Galway.

"On 11 November, we came to Galway for a war memorial. It was the war memorial for the First War, but they also discussed Darfur. I met people there from the Amnesty organisation, and the mayor [Niall Ó Brolcháin]. There were plenty of people there, all talking about Darfur. Since that time, I love Galway," he says.

Suleiman's first impression of Galway was of "a beautiful city". He could not believe so many people here were concerned about the strife in his native country.

"People here understand that there is war in Darfur. And the international community is trying to pressurise the Sudanese Government. We need accountability for who did the crimes. I call it a Holocaust. We need peace and justice and they are the same – you can't have one without the other. I will never forget it and I will contribute as much as I can."

He now speaks at both the Galway One World Centre and Amnesty International to raise awareness about the problems in Darfur.

His favourable impression of the city led him to settle in Galway when he finally received refugee status in December 2007.