Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Preface: Children on the Move are Children in the First Place
- Contents
- List of Cases
- List of Authors
- Protection of Minors in European Migration Law
- Participation of Children in Asylum Procedures
- Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children as Rights Holders: Theory and Reality in the EU Legal System
- The Rights of Minor Siblings in Migration: Why Migration Policies should Stop Systematically Separating Siblings
- The (Limited) Role of Children’s Rights in EU Family Reunification Law for Beneficiaries of International Protection
- Combatting Child Smuggling and Trafficking: A Comparative Study of the Situation in Nine European States
- Is Immigration Detention Out of the Question? A Child-Based Approach to Immigration Detention and Family Unity
- The Detention of Unaccompanied Minors in EU Asylum Law: What is Left of Children’s Rights?
- How Protective is Custody for Unaccompanied Minors in Greece? Protecting Children’s Rights within Detention
- Appellate Asylum and Migration Proceedings in Belgium: Challenges for the Best Interests of the Child Principle and Unity of Jurisprudence
- Child Asylum Seekers in Botswana: A Critique of the Ngezi and Iragi Decisions
- The Impact of Brexit on Migrant Children’s Rights: Taking Responsibility without Solidarity
- Index
- About the Editors
How Protective is Custody for Unaccompanied Minors in Greece? Protecting Children’s Rights within Detention
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 April 2020
- Frontmatter
- Preface: Children on the Move are Children in the First Place
- Contents
- List of Cases
- List of Authors
- Protection of Minors in European Migration Law
- Participation of Children in Asylum Procedures
- Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children as Rights Holders: Theory and Reality in the EU Legal System
- The Rights of Minor Siblings in Migration: Why Migration Policies should Stop Systematically Separating Siblings
- The (Limited) Role of Children’s Rights in EU Family Reunification Law for Beneficiaries of International Protection
- Combatting Child Smuggling and Trafficking: A Comparative Study of the Situation in Nine European States
- Is Immigration Detention Out of the Question? A Child-Based Approach to Immigration Detention and Family Unity
- The Detention of Unaccompanied Minors in EU Asylum Law: What is Left of Children’s Rights?
- How Protective is Custody for Unaccompanied Minors in Greece? Protecting Children’s Rights within Detention
- Appellate Asylum and Migration Proceedings in Belgium: Challenges for the Best Interests of the Child Principle and Unity of Jurisprudence
- Child Asylum Seekers in Botswana: A Critique of the Ngezi and Iragi Decisions
- The Impact of Brexit on Migrant Children’s Rights: Taking Responsibility without Solidarity
- Index
- About the Editors
Summary
INTRODUCTION
Protecting the human rights of children under the scope of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and embodying them in the domestic policy of the ratifying Member States, has always been a goal to be achieved. In the meantime, due to the massive migration flows arriving in the area of the Mediterranean, literature and research have excessively focused upon Greece for being a stepping-stone to safety for the majority of those in quest of refuge in Europe. Among those asylum-seeking individuals arriving in Greece, unaccompanied minors (UAM) are particularly in need of certain UNCRC rights to be granted to them at arrival, given their youth and their unique socio- legal status. Currently, the situation UAM experience in Greece is particularly complex, as all migrant minors, regardless of whether or not they apply for international protection, are, by law, to be immediately apprehended for entering the country in an irregular manner and consequently to be placed under what is known as protective custody, in specially designed short-term hosting facilities provided by the state, where they are also to be provided with sufficient care and assistance until referred to appropriate hosting units.
However, due to the state's inability to adequately and promptly cover the accommodation needs of all UAM arriving in the country, this procedure is often replaced by administrative detention, until these minors are further referred to suitable long-term accommodation structures. Hence, in the meantime, UAM are most commonly placed in detention facilities, usually under police administration, where they are often subjected to highly inappropriate and clearly problematic conditions, thus raising crucial questions in the area of protecting children's rights under the scope of the UNCRC provisions. In addition to the above, this form of detention often exacerbates existing medical, psychological and social needs arising from being an asylum seeker in the first place, eventually corroborating the country's failure to provide ample and suitable refuge to UAM at arrival, leading to a custody regime euphemistically considered to be protective, while in reality UAM are simply placed under procedures of detention. The question therefore still lies on whether or not protective custody for UAM successfully manages to protect children's rights as enshrined in the UNCRC.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Safeguarding Children's Rights in Immigration Law , pp. 179 - 194Publisher: IntersentiaPrint publication year: 2020