Unaccompanied minor

Greece's Parliament approved on Wednesday a Migration Ministry legislation that overhauls that migration code, clarifying regulations about residence permits for non-EU migrants and unaccompanied children, and incorporating a related EU Directive (2021/1883/EK). 

A voluntary scheme by European Union member states to accept unaccompanied migrant children from Greece officially ended Tuesday, raising concern over delays still facing the bloc in hammering out a comprehensive new migration agreement.

Most unaccompanied refugee children are left outside the asylum system, according to 15 organizations that make up the Child Rights Advocacy Network, which issued a statement saying a draft bill on migration "creates more difficulties than it solves."

A British minister said Albanian children are prominent among migrant youngsters who have gone missing from hostels and hotels run by the Home Office - the UK equivalent to the Interior Ministry.

Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick told MPs that of 4,600 child asylum seekers who had arrived in the UK since 2021, 440 had gone missing and only about half had returned.

Over 100% overcrowding of unaccompanied refugee children in the Refugee Center "Military Ramp".

The Council of Ministers Wednesday adopted a National Migration Strategy of the Republic of Bulgaria for the 2021-2025 period, the Government Information Service said.

The International Organization of Migration (IOM) said on Monday it had set up two new safe zones for unaccompanied minors inside the migrant camps of Vagiohori, east of Thessaloniki, and Filipiada, northwest of Arta.

These areas provide educational and creative activities, sports and transportation where needed, aiming at the children's eventual integration into local societies.

A group of 86 asylum seekers, most of whom had previously been staying on eastern Aegean islands, flew to Hannover, Germany on Thursday as part of a resettlement program of 1,024 asylum seekers which began last July. 

The group that left on Thursday consisted of children with serious health problems, along with family members.

An employee working at the Sindos shelter for unaccompanied minors in northern Greece has tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, a local news website reported on Thursday.

Manos Logothetis, the secretary general for the Reception of Asylum Seekers, told GRTimes.gr that the facility was temporarily quarantined until the tests on all the minors housed there came back negative.

The process of moving thousands of migrants out of state facilities and subsidized accommodation across the country is to begin on Monday though authorities have not determined which facilities will be affected first nor how long the process will take.