The decisions of the broad official meeting held under the President of the Republic of Cyprus, Mr.Nicos Anastasiades, are focused on two pillars, aiming at the discharge of the First Reception Centre "Pournara". The first pillar concerns minors and the second pillar concerns adults, said Interior Minister Nikos Nouris in his statements after the meeting.
The Interior Minister said that the President of the Republic visited the "Pournara" First Reception Centre to see the facilities and the problems it faces, also talking to a number of migrants.
The wide-ranging meeting at the Presidential Palace which followed, the Minister noted, had as its sole subject the way of discharging the Centre in Pournara.
The discussion essentially focused on two pillars, which concerned the discharge of adult residents from the Purnara First Reception Centre and separately on the issue of minors.
The Interior Minister noted that in the direction of facilitating and discharging the Centre, decisions have been taken, which include that for adults there will be a temporary transformation of the "Lakes" Accommodation Centre in Menoyia, in order to transfer a number of residents from "Pournara" and reduce the number.
He informed that so far, those whose applications were rejected were transferred to the "Lakes" Centre. He explained that because it is an open Centre there is an opportunity for residents to leave and currently, he said, there is scope to accommodate a significant number. It will help temporarily as a First Accommodation Centre, that is in line with Pournara, the Minister said.
With regard to minors, Mr. Nouris recalled that the number last Friday was 356 and 92 people have been moved to a hotel unit in Larnaca, which is rented by the Ministry of Interior to accommodate contacts from the coroner. Buffer strips have been created and 92 minors are being accommodated, who have been moved from Pournara, he explained.
Of the remaining 275 currently staying at Pournara, there will be a corresponding search for another place in the next few days, possibly within the day, he said. Nouris, so that there will be a transfer of about 150 additional minors, i.e. those whose procedures are advanced and the remaining part of their procedures can be done in an external place outside Pournaras.
He added that with these decisions for minors, the number is expected to be limited to 120 persons in Pournaras, which is within the possibilities and specifications, the so-called safety zones.
Mr. Nouris said that as the Ministry of Interior and the Deputy Ministry of Welfare "we will continue to rapidly examine the applications of the minors who are in 'Pournara' in order to prevent the possibility of an increase in the number."
In response to a reporter's question about the impression of poor living conditions created for the minors and the criticisms from the opposition that the state has not taken care of these children, Mr. Nouris said that the Ministry of Interior and the Deputy Ministry of Welfare "will continue to rapidly examine the applications of the minors who are in 'Pournara' in order to prevent the possibility of an increase in the number."
In response to a reporter's question about the impression of poor living conditions created for the minors and the criticisms from the opposition that the state has not taken care of these children, Mr. He clarified that last Friday, when "we had the maximum number, which was 356, none of the 356 minors had ever stayed in accommodation, except in accommodation that had air conditioning and heating."
He added that what has been said is that the accommodation in question had a maximum capacity of 120 children, in accordance with EU standards. "Instead they were accommodating three times that number," he clarified."
He said it was a conscious choice not to allow children to stay outside the accommodation from a safety and climatic point of view, even with increased numbers. "That is why we moved 92 on Saturday and the additional 150 we are moving now to bring the numbers back up," he noted.
On the issue of feeding, which was also talked about too much, the minister pointed out that extreme positions were taken which he said some people made sure to multiply by spreading them in "catchy" terms.
"We have demonstrated this morning and have presented the complete package that is provided both on admission to the Centre, in terms of clothing, but also in terms of food, the specific meals that are provided on the basis of the specifications prepared for us by the Higher Hotel Institute," the Minister said. "The only observation made is that there is no hot drink at breakfast, instead there was water," he added. "Specific action will also be taken on this to add the hot drink," he said."
He pointed out that the reality is far from the criticism received by the Home Ministry "that a bottle of water and a piece of bread is being given.
Asked whether the structures are adequate, the Minister replied that the basis of asylum and immigration procedures stipulates that a country should have a First Reception Centre, which in Cyprus today is "Pournara". He added that Cyprus only acquired in November 2021, the Accommodation Centre in "Lakes", while a country should also have a pre-removal centre, which Cyprus currently does not have. He explained that "it is the Centre for which we have applied for 57 million euros of funding from the European Commission and I hope that in the next few days we will have the answer". "We have already committed 15 million from the national budget to start the process of building it next to the Lakes Hospitality Centre," he said. Those in the process of return will be placed in this centre, which will be closed, he added.
Answering whether the First Reception Centre should provide education to minors, he said it is a short-term accommodation for both adults and minors and it is not the responsibility of the centre to provide education or other activities.
He clarified that education is not the responsibility of the Ministry, but a service provided by the Deputy Ministry of Welfare through the Social Workers, giving as an example the Open Reception Center for Unaccompanied Minors of the "Hope For Children" CRC Policy Center where there are instructors for learning Greek language and other activities.
"The chain of asylum and migration is clear. It defines what everyone has to offer, and when the children leave the 'Pournara' Center, all this is taken over by the Ministry of Welfare through its own procedures," the Minister noted.
Asked about the status of the agreement signed with FRONTEX and whether we will see significant numbers of migrants returning to their country of origin, the Minister noted that the problem of returns is not a Cypriot problem, but a European problem, saying that there is an objective difficulty and reluctance of a number of countries to accept even their own nationals.
He said that there is neither a magic recipe nor a magic solution to this problem and added that the Republic of Cyprus has a mountain ahead of it, because for the fifth consecutive year it is receiving the largest migratory burden. "An undesirable first for which we are making huge efforts to get rid of it."
He said that on a daily basis the inflows range from 60 to 100 people, all from the green line, based on the physiognomy of the migratory flows. Today, among the 150 children for example who will be moved, 128 are Somalis and the other 40 are from Congo. "We didn't have this demography 12 months ago. We had Syrian children, Pakistani children, Indian children and so on. Now the migratory physiognomy has changed radically," he said.
He noted that the capacities of the state are given and specific decisions have been taken today to manage migration, while, he continued, two other pieces remain. The first concerns inflows, for which the Green Line should be properly managed in accordance with what has been agreed with European partners, and the second concerns the acceleration of returns.
He said he has been involved in a number of contacts recently, and since some countries are not cooperating, Cyprus has launched a new effort of engaging other countries that may have relations with such countries to make joint flights.
He said the government has already reached an understanding with Belgium, because of the fact that Congo was a Belgian colony until a few years ago, for a joint return flight, and the ministry is in the process of agreeing on a new one. He added that Cyprus has agreed with Germany for a joint flight to Pakistan and said that as Cyprus we have carried out a return flight to Vietnam on our own. At the same time, the ministry has coordinated and agreed with Greece for a joint flight to Bangladesh on March 29.
"To date, until the last days of February, we had managed to return for 2022 around 500 irregular migrants whose applications had been rejected. In 2021 the returns were 2,300 which proportionally was a very high number for the Republic of Cyprus compared to the past, but it is far from the numbers we need to complete as returns to be able to manage this huge number we have in the country today," he said.
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