Via the Athens News
A SHOWDOWN is looming over a historic overhaul of Greece’s decades-old system of citizenship rules on the naturalisation of immigrants and their children.
Ruling socialist Pasok on February 8 tabled a watered-down version of a bill aimed at putting most children of immigrants who were born and raised in Greece on a [...]
Via Neoskosmos
Walking on Thessaloniki’s Aristotelous square some leaflets draw my attention.
“You are born Greek, you don’t become Greek” it was the slogan on them, while they were calling people to condemn government’s proposal for granting Greek citizenship to immigrants.
A few meters away, in the wall you could clearly see the graffiti-written message “Solidarity to all [...]
I am intrigued to know which people were living in trees while Greeks were building the Parthenon ?
Via Kathimerini
A bid to grant citizenship to thousands of second-generation immigrants caused more intense debate over the weekend as the right-wing nationalist Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) claimed it has the Church of Greece’s support in opposing the draft [...]
A positive article from Athens Plus
The government’s decision to grant citizenship to immigrants and their children makes sense on so many levels that it is difficult to see why it is the subject of such virulent opposition. It is reasonable to expect a lively and informed debate on an issue that will change the fabric [...]
Via the Athens News
AFTER visiting one of the country’s most criticised migrant detention centres, Spyros Vouyias, the new deputy minister for the protection of the citizen, condemned the state of the overcrowded facility using language surprisingly harsh for a government minister.
“I apologise for the lack of humanity in this warehouse of souls where Dante’s Inferno [...]
Via Kathimerini
Deputy Citizens’ Protection Minister Spyros Vougias yesterday heralded an investigation into the fate of several hundred thousand euros in European Union funding released to the previous conservative government for the purpose of accommodating a relentless influx of illegal immigrants into Greece from neighboring Turkey.
“We are going to look at where this money went as [...]
Is this a change of heart from this previous attitude ?
Via Kathimerini
Migrants to join police
Minister wants foreigners on the force, orders probe into Pakistani death
Citizens’ Protection Minister Michalis Chrysochoidis yesterday said he was determined to integrate immigrants into the police force following talks with members of the Pakistani community regarding the death of a 25-year-old [...]
The BBC’s Europe editor Gavin Hewitt has an article up at his blog called Greece’s Immigrants in Limbo
On a hill above the town of Samos in eastern Greece are a series of long buildings with grey walls and red roofs. They could be a barracks but this is a detention centre for immigrants. It [...]
The Human Rights Watch has released a report on Greece saying that
The European Union should press the newly elected Greek government to end the abusive detention and summary expulsions of migrants, including unaccompanied children, and to reform the country’s broken asylum system
You can read the full report here
Also, see the latest news article from the [...]
Via Human Rights Watch
France, the UK, and the rest of Europe act as if everything is perfectly fine in Greece. But Greece denies 99.5 percent of all asylum claims, has recently eliminated its appeals procedure, and detains migrants in deplorable conditions.
Bill Frelick, refugee policy director at Human Rights Watch
France: Don’t Return [...]
Via Athens Plus
[Athens Plus is only available for download. Link at the end of the article]
Immigrants fill gap as Greeks opt out of grazing lifestyle
As family shepherd units dwindle, bureaucracy hinders short-staffed livestock breeders
BY STAVROS TZIMAS
About 130,000 families still graze their herds on Greece’s rugged mountains but in very few of them is the [...]
A first-hand account of what is happening at the Pagani detention centre in Lesvos. The picture on the site of the children hugging their dad through the bars is heartbreaking. Via Doctors without Borders
Ioanna Kotsioni works as the Deputy Head of Mission for the Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) project providing assistance to migrants, [...]
Via Kathimerini
The Interior Ministry yesterday vowed to boost funding and recruitment at several migrant reception centers on the country’s land and sea borders with Turkey, where overcrowding has created serious tensions prompting protests and hunger strikes by detainees.
Officials from the local authorities on the eastern Aegean islands of Lesvos, Chios and Samos and from the [...]
[Photograph by Afrodite Al Salech]
Unaccompanied, undocumented children are not criminals. They have done nothing wrong. They have escaped from unspeakable situations, been separated from or lost their parents and are relying on Greece to help them survive. To give them a chance. They should never be behind bars. This is deeply, deeply disturbing.
Via the United [...]
[This 13 year old boy had been denied treatment for two days before being taken to hospital. Photograph from Noborder Camp Lesvos 2009]
Human Rights Watch are circulating this article about the plight of unaccompanied migrant children being held in Greece in appalling conditions. This follows YouTube videos, news articles and reports about the conditions in [...]
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