Behrouz Boochani has described Thursday's historic refugee deal between New Zealand and Australia as an achievement for refugees, people fighting for civil societies, and for New Zealand.
An almost decade-old offer from New Zealand to resettle 150 refugees a year from Australia was agreed to on Thursday, nine years after it was first offered by the New Zealand Government.
It will mean that 150 refugees either residing in Nauru, or temporarily in Australia in regional processing, will be able to come to New Zealand each year, for three years.
They will also have to meet New Zealand’s Refugee Quota Programme requirements and be referred to New Zealand by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
READ MORE: Nauru asylum seeker 'shook' by NZ/Aus refugee agreement
Writer Behrouz Boochani fled Iran to Australia in 2013 to avoid persecution in his homeland for his journalism, only to spend six years detained in an offshore detention centre.
The offer is nearly a decade-old.
He recorded his experience by writing the award-winning book No Friend but the Mountains on smartphone app WhatsApp while held by Australian authorities at the Papua New Guinea detention centre.
In 2019 he was released and came to New Zealand, where he was granted refugee status in 2020.
He described the deal as "big news" and a long time coming for refugees stuck in purgatory at offshore detention centres.
"I look at it as an achievement. An achievement for refugees, for civil society that people have been fighting for many years, and also an achievement for New Zealand," Boochani told 1News.
"It gives a positive, beautiful picture of New Zealand and is also a lesson to Australia."
Boochani said New Zealand was "a good place" where refugees were supported - a stark contrast to his views of Australia, which he said had made up a "political lie" accusing refugees of wanting to use New Zealand as a back door to get residency in Australia.
"Why would people who come here want to go to Australia?" Boochani said.
"It was a big political lie. That is normal in political culture in Australia, to say these kind of things.
"I'm sure when refugees come here [to New Zealand] they will be able to establish a new life and they will be happy."
The 150 places are part of New Zealand's annual 1500 refugee intake - which New Zealand has not fulfilled and is not likely to bring in the full intake by the middle of this year.
Immigration Minister Kris Faafoi said he hoped we would see some of the refugees arrive in New Zealand by the end of the year.
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