Some 4,962 unaccompanied minors currently live in Greece, the National Center of Social Solidarity reported on Wednesday, while only one in four are accommodated in humane conditions.
The organizations said at a presentation that the main problems these children face are very limited access to basic housing, food and water, and lack of legal representation.
“Some 1,117 unaccompanied minors live at the Moria hotspot (the Lesvos Island camp), of whom 140 live in long-term accommodation facilities and 350 in slightly better facilities there, yet none of them have access to translators, welfare officers or psychologists,” said Elina Sarantou of HIAS, a Jewish-American nonprofit organization which provides humanitarian aid and assistance to refugees.
“The most shocking data, however,” added Gabriel Sakellaridis, the Director of Amnesty International Greece, “is that some 1,200 unaccompanied minors are gone missing and are most likely exposed to serious perils, wandering beyond and away from official protection systems.”
Nearly half of all the recorded refugee population in 2018 were children, say international humanitarian organizations, while minors continue to account for one third of all migrant arrivals in Greece, according to figures recorded thus far in 2019.
Source: AMNA
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