EU, Move Asylum-Seeking Children Out of Deplorable Detention in Greece!

In violation of Greek and International Law, unaccompanied migrant children are being detained in Greece under deplorable conditions.

Last week Human Rights Watch released a report documenting the routine lock up of children in "small, overcrowded, and unhygienic detention or jail cells for weeks and months," where there is little access to "basic care and services." Not only are the conditions unsanitary, adds HRW, sometimes these children who have fled from violence face more violence from police or from being held in cells with unrelated adults.

In addition to the already excessive time Greek law allows these children to be detained before being transferred to a shelter, HRW found some children were held even longer. One teen detainee reported that he "slept with rats," and another said he was held with adults who did drugs. A few of the children reported that they had been abused by the police.

Greece told HRW that it had to detain the children for their protection, but who could argue that anyone, especially children, need this kind of "protection"? To its credit, however, Greece has asked the EU to "make all unaccompanied children eligible for relocation," but the report says EU rejected that plea.

Sign this petition to insist the EU speed up the transfer of asylum seekers detained in Greece, as UN's High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi has suggested.