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Procedures should be initiated without further delay to identify or create structures or accommodation facilities to move unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors from the "Pournara" accommodation centre without further delay, recommends the Commissioner for Administration Maria Stylianou-Lottidi in her Report, while noting that these persons should not be deprived of their liberty and live in conditions that degrade their dignity and constitute inhuman treatment.
The Commissioner's Report, which is submitted to the Minister of Interior Nikos Nouris and the Deputy Minister of Social Welfare Anastasia Anthousis, for coordination between them and for taking the necessary measures, on the basis of their respective competences, for the immediate and immediate implementation of her recommendations, based on her findings from an unannounced site visit she made to the centre on 14 February 2022, her visit to the site of the Children's Shelter run by the NGO Hope for Children in Nicosia on the morning of 9 March 2022 and information received from the Asylum Service and UNHCR.
The visit took place within the framework of its competence as the National Mechanism for the Prevention of Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, in connection with its competence as the National Human Rights Authority.
About her visit to "Purnara", the Commissioner writes that "the maximum capacity of the Centre, as we were informed, is 1,200 persons and on the day of the visit it hosted 2,280 persons, of which about 1,700-1800 were men and the remaining persons were women. Of the total number of persons staying at the Centre, 310 were minors and/or allegedly minors."
Cold water, drainage pits that constantly overflow, volume of garbage
According to the Report, "in the areas where minors and families stay, there are built-in bathrooms and latrines, while chemical bathrooms and toilets have been installed in the other areas of the Centre."
However, it is noted, "the water in the bathrooms is generally cold, due to the large number of persons using them, so that there is insufficient time for it to heat up".
It is added that "the drainage pits were constructed to specifications to serve up to 500 people, and with the presence of more than 2,000 people they constantly overflow, necessitating the daily attendance of a vehicle at the centre to empty/clean them".
It is stated that "this problem is expected to be resolved by connecting the Centre to the sewerage system of Kokkinotrimithia, which, as the Asylum Service Officer told us, is already on track."
Also, "a major issue that, according to the Asylum Service Officer, they face at the Centre is the large volume of garbage generated. To mitigate the problem, a garbage truck comes to the Centre every day and a compactor of dog waste has been placed outside the Centre, but this is not enough to solve the problem permanently." It is suggested that "it would be helpful if the Centre's recycling activities could be stepped up, particularly for the plastic water bottles given to guests".
50 days is the average length of stay for unaccompanied minors, some over 100
As stated, in "Pournara", "there are unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors staying at the Centre for a long period of time, until it is possible to determine their age, and in some cases some of them, although they are obviously minors" and have been judged by the Asylum Service as minors, are still in the Centre.
This, the Commissioner notes, 'in addition to being inconsistent with the international legal framework relating to the protection and safeguarding of children's rights, deprives the minors and/or alleged minors concerned of the benefit of the doubt, on the basis of which their position that they are indeed minors should be accepted and they should be treated and dealt with accordingly and appropriately'.
It refers to the disagreement of the Social Welfare Services with the assessment of the age of unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors and the questioning of the findings of the Asylum Service, noting that this "de facto exacerbates the problems, on the one hand, because it violates the human rights of children by prolonging their uncertainty and distress, while at the same time limiting their freedom for an indefinite period of time; on the other hand, it does not solve the problem of overcrowding in the Centre".
It is stated that in several cases, although the relevant procedures have been completed, children remain at the Centre because there is no other suitable place for them to be transferred, noting that this "is not in line with international standards, according to which States should ensure that children are placed in age-appropriate places, such as homes and foster families".
"In particular when it comes to unaccompanied children, their stay in closed centres cannot be justified because they are unaccompanied or separated from their family, nor because they are migrants or because of their residence status," it underlines.
To this end, it adds, "when it is not possible for unaccompanied children to be placed with family members residing in the host country, other alternatives, such as residential institutions, should be available to meet the needs for their proper physical and mental development, with a view to ensuring their best interests".
Further, it states, "as long as children live in closed centres, their right to education should be guaranteed, which should ideally be provided outside the centre, they should be provided with free time and play with other children, and every effort should be made and priority should be given to the processing of their asylum applications to enable their immediate transfer to other forms of appropriate accommodation".
In particular, it is noted, "access to the education system should be ensured for minor asylum seekers, and education may be provided for them within the accommodation centre. This procedure should not be delayed beyond three months from the date of submission of the application for international protection."
According to the Commissioner, "the average stay of unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors at the centre is, we are informed, fifty days. However, some of them were in the Centre for more than one hundred days, and one unaccompanied girl was in the Centre for six months because the age assessment procedure had not yet been completed."
"With the exception, as we have been told, of the unaccompanied minors from Somalia, for whom it is not possible to establish directly that they are minors, the remaining minors and/or alleged minors are manifestly and obviously minors, whose age ranges between fourteen and eighteen years old," it says.
It adds that "of the total number of unaccompanied minors accommodated at the Centre at the time of the visit, seventy-eight of them had completed the procedures, but were still staying at the Centre because there was no space available outside the Centre to move them".
The Recommendations
"Procedures should be rolled out to identify and/or create sufficient structures and/or other accommodation for the immediate and immediate removal without further delay of all unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors from the Centre, without exception," the Commissioner states in her recommendations.
Their further stay in the Centre, it notes, "is not appropriate, both because of the conditions prevailing in the Centre and because unaccompanied and/or allegedly unaccompanied minors should not be deprived of their liberty and should not be deprived of their liberty and should not live in conditions similar to places of detention, such as closed accommodation centres and in conditions which undermine their dignity and constitute inhuman treatment".
The Commissioner considers that "Welfare Services should stop questioning the findings of the age assessment carried out by the Asylum Service and, in view of the benefit of the doubt that should govern decisions concerning children, take the necessary steps to move them immediately out of the centre, even when their age is in doubt or has not yet been determined".
Consequently, it states, "on the one hand, the procedures for determining their age should be completed in good time and as soon as possible, as should the examination of their applications for asylum; on the other hand, and irrespective of those procedures, they should be moved as soon as possible to places outside the Centre and, to that end, there should be direct cooperation between the Asylum Service and the Social Welfare Services with a view to adopting the findings of the former".
According to the Commissioner for Administration, "recourse to medical examination as a way of determining/assessing the age of unaccompanied minors and/or alleged minors should not be the rule but a last resort to achieve the specific purpose".
"All minors and/or alleged minors should be granted the benefit of the doubt as to their age, all the more so in the case of children who are manifestly minors," he said.
It recommends that the Ministry of State for Social Welfare "immediately attend to the children who remain outside the Hope for Children shelter to ensure their best interests and taking into account their wishes, as provided for in the Convention on the Rights of the Child".
At the same time, it points out that throughout the period that unaccompanied and/or allegedly unaccompanied minors reside in the Centre, they should be "provided with the necessary care and comforts appropriate to their age, and in the extreme case where their stay exceeds ninety days, although this should be avoided, their access to education should be ensured".
"When a minor and/or alleged minor enters the Centre, he or she should immediately be placed, if this is not already the case, under the responsibility and protection of the Ministry of State for Social Welfare, so that his or her best interests can be safeguarded," it says.
It calls on those responsible to initiate "immediately and without any delay the necessary measures and actions to resolve the problem of inadequate hot water supply so that all residents of the Centre, without exception, can have unhindered access to hot water".
It recommends that "the necessary steps be taken to resolve the problems observed with the Centre's drainage systems".
It recommends that 'the problem of the lack of lighting in all areas of the Centre at night should be resolved as soon as possible in order to improve the sense of security of those staying in the Centre at night and to facilitate the detection and prevention of any untoward incidents'.
"Although it is recognised that migration flows have increased and the competent authorities are no longer able to respond in a timely manner to the examination of the applications submitted, efforts should be made to process them as quickly as possible so that the persons concerned can be moved outside the Centre," it said.
It asks those responsible to "make the utmost efforts to improve all infrastructure at the Centre, as well as to ensure that no person is obliged to sleep on the floor".
"The Report is submitted to the Minister of Interior and the Deputy Minister of Social Welfare, for coordination between them and to take the necessary measures, on the basis of their competences, for the immediate and without delay implementation of the aforementioned recommendations," it concludes.
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