A new process for registering asylum seekers was launched in Greece on June 8.
The new pre-registration process is aimed at speeding up the process by which families can be reunified and requests for relocation for those migrants who wish to move on from Greece to other EU countries.
This fresh approach of processing asylum seekers is being funded by the European Commission and run by the Greek Asylum Service, the UN refugee agency and the European Asylum Support Office.
The pre-registration process will help Greece identify nationalities of asylum seekers and prioritize the cases accordingly such as identifying unaccompanied children and people with medical emergencies.
Greece is hopeful that the new procedures will help to meet the demands placed on the already economically crippled country. The country is now faced with vast task of processing the tens of thousands of migrants who are currently living at temporary accommodation sites in Greece due to FYROM and other EU countries closing their borders.
During the first three days following the employment of the new registration process, 1,200 people were able to be pre-registered at camps in both Athens and Thessaloniki.
Once the pre-registration is complete, migrants receive an asylum seeker’s card that allows them to legally stay in Greece and gives them access to some basic services, at least until the country makes a decision regarding their asylum request.
The Greek Asylum Service will be sending out text messages to those migrants who are pre-registered by the end of July to inform them on the next steps of the process and the location and date of their next appointment.
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