Recognised refugees in Greece face insurmountable obstacles when trying to exercise their right to family reunification with their close family members. This is despite the fact that family reunification pathways for refugees constitute a legal obligation for Member States like Greece, to ensure that protected families are able to reconstruct links with their relatives, often broken by their forced exile and displacement. 

The report’s findings indicate that unaccompanied children arriving in Greece and applying for family reunion are waiting an average of 16 months from arrival until transfer, far exceeding the maximum of 11 months provided for in the Dublin Regulation. In some cases, children have been made to wait for over a year and a half.

“It is completely unacceptable that refugee children seeking sanctuary are being forced to live in conditions so appalling that some are resorting to suicide attempts. No child should face the daily threat of extreme violence, the stench of raw sewage and respiratory diseases caused by police tear gas.”