Child refugees in Greece forced to sell bodies

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Child refugees in Europe 'forced to sell bodies' to pay smugglers
Diane Taylor
Tuesday 18 April 2017 17.28 BST


Governments urged to end ‘most heinous human rights violation’ as report finds widespread sexual exploitation of migrant children in Greece.


Young people inside a refugee camp in north-east Greece. Photograph: Patrick Kingsley for the Guardian

Unaccompanied child refugees in Greece desperate to reach the UK and other parts of northern Europe are being forced to sell their bodies in order to pay smugglers to help them with their journeys, according to a new report from Harvard University.

The report, from Dr Vasileia Digidiki and Prof Jacqueline Bhabha at the university’s centre for health and human rights, reveals what they describe as a “growing epidemic of sexual exploitation and abuse of migrant children in Greece”.

The report says child refugees from conflict zones including Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan trying to make their way across Europe are being stranded in Greece, unable to afford the fees charged by smugglers to move them.

As a result some of the children are turning to selling sex to try to fund their journeys.

Report author Digidiki said: “This emergency can no longer be ignored. We can no longer sit idle while migrant children are abused and forced to sell their bodies in broad daylight and plain sight in the heart of Athens simply to survive.

“It is our responsibility as human beings to face this emergency head on and take immediate action at every level to put an end to this most heinous violation of dignity and human rights.”

The report found that the average price of a sexual transaction with a child is €15 (£12.50). The largest group of children selling sex are Afghani boys along with Syrians, Iraqis and Iranians. The majority of customers are older men aged 35 and over.

Smugglers often charge thousands of euros to move people across Europe and so despite selling sex many children find that the fees charged by smugglers are still beyond their reach.

The Home Office has declined to comment on how many child refugees it has transferred recently under section 67 of the Immigration Act, known as the Dubs amendment, where a certain number of vulnerable unaccompanied refugee children will be transferred to the UK.

“What these numbers underscore is the reluctance of many European countries to provide refugee children with a safe and permanent home,” the report’s authors state.

While the report finds that Greek authorities have made some appropriate provision for vulnerable migrant children in specialised camps and centres, many do not have access to these safer facilities and are at risk of exploitation and violence.

The report finds that child sexual exploitation is high in both urban and rural settings in Greece. It also found that some of the children selling sex become addicted to drugs making it even less likely that they will be able to afford to pay smugglers and leave Greece to continue with their journeys.

The report calls for an end to the detention of child migrants in Greece, more specialised shelters for children who have been abused, an improved legal guardianship system, better data collection relating to child refugees, independent translators and separate areas in the refugee camps for children and families.

It concludes that there has been “a dramatic failure of protection affecting significant numbers of child migrants and refugees within Europe today”.

It also identifies rape and other forms of sexual assault of young children in the camps, an increase in child marriage and blackmail of some children who have been abused and had humiliating photos taken of them by mafia gangs who blackmail them by threatening to send the photos to unaccompanied children’s families back home.

Co-author Bhabha said: “This report documents a shocking and pervasive aspect of the current refugee crisis: the exposure of very young children to sexual exploitation as a survival strategy.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/...ers?CMP=twt_gu

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‘Survival of fittest’: Children sexually assaulted at EU’s official refugee camps
15 Aug, 2016 07:34

Refugee children as young as seven have been sexually assaulted in official EU migrant camps in Greece, where children and women are said to be too afraid to go outside their tents when it’s dark, a report states, citing charities working at the venues.

The revelations were published in the Observer on Saturday.

The report takes a closer look at the Softex refugee camp, a former toilet roll factory on the outskirts of Thessaloniki in Greece that hosts some 1,400 asylum seekers from besieged Syria, of whom 170 are thought to be children, according to the news outlet’s data.

The Observer quoted a local volunteer who stated that “some young girls had been effectively groomed by male gangs.” Speaking on condition of anonymity, he described an attack on a seven-year-old Iraqi girl, whose parents “are still in disbelief over what happened.”

“A man from one of the ‘mafia’ groups asked their seven-year-old daughter into their tent to play games on his phone and then zipped up the tent. She came back with marks on her arms and neck. Later the girl described how she was sexually abused. It has scarred a seven-year-old child for life,” he said.

The Iraqi family was reportedly later moved out of the camp and into an emergency facility.

The Softex refugee camp was built after the closure of the illegal Idomeni camp on Greece’s Macedonian border, where numerous clashes were seen between police and asylum seekers. The refugees from Idomeni were later relocated to Thessaloniki and its surrounding area by Greek authorities.

Reports of children being sexually abused in Greek refugee camps have also been heard by Anna Chiara Nava of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders) in Thessaloniki.

“It’s really hard for the unaccompanied minors – 16- and 17-years-olds – to survive. It’s the survival of the fittest in there. In the evening and night, it’s impossible to find them because they are hiding in the tents.”

She added that the women are also afraid. “They complain that during the night and evening they cannot go to the toilet alone. They have all heard of reports of others being attacked,” said Nava.

The Observer also cited Anita Dullard of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, who said the organization had informed the government of a spike in sexual abuse in Greece’s refugee camps and was also keeping in touch with the UN concerning the issue.

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REFUGEE AND MIGRANT CHILDREN AT RISK OF EXPLOITATION AS GREECE’S INFRASTRUCTURE IS OVERWHELMED

Thursday 6 August 2015
A new assessment by Save the Children in Greece has revealed that refugee and migrant children are being left at risk of exploitation and disease, because of an almost total lack of official reception facilities.

Currently around 1,000 people are landing on the Dodecanese islands every day, the majority of them Syrians seeking sanctuary in Europe. In June alone 4,270 children landed on the islands, 86 of them unaccompanied.

The reception system is overwhelmed, meaning provisions of food, water, medicine and a safe place to sleep fall far short of what is needed. There are nine existing ‘First Reception Centres’, but because of funding shortfalls only one functions as a full reception centre – the others more closely resemble detention centres. Local civil society and international charities have stepped in to fill some of the gaps, but children are still living in appalling conditions.

Vulnerable children, particularly those sleeping outside alone or locked in large mixed groups in cramped detention centres, are at risk of trafficking, sexual exploitation and physical abuse. Children told Save the Children staff in Lesvos, Chios, Kos and Athens that they hadn’t eaten for days in some cases and were afraid to sleep outside or go to the bathroom at night because of the risk of abuse.

Babies and young children are also particularly at risk from diarrheal diseases, severe sunburn, heatstroke and dehydration, which can prove fatal to young children. In the informal camps 90 per cent of people do not have an adequate place to sleep - such as a tent - and there is little in the way of washing facilities.

Francis Wood, Save the Children’s, says: “Refugee and migrant children, particularly unaccompanied children making this dangerous journey alone, are being failed in Greece.

“The risk to a child forced to sleep on the street of being molested, or of a baby dying of heatstroke, is very real. And it’s happening right on Europe’s doorstep.”

The Greek government bears responsibility for setting up a safe, efficient system of reception for refugees and migrants arriving on its shores, but the burden cannot fall on Greece alone. The people arriving are seeking sanctuary across the continent and as such, the European Union bears collective responsibility for dealing with the crisis. We therefore encourage the EU to increase the number of relocations from Italy and Greece and to put in place a permanent system to address future emergencies. The United Nations and non-governmental organisations also have a role to play in ensuring that refugees and migrants are treated with dignity and that vulnerable children are protected.

Save the Children is distributing essential basic items such as nappies, hygiene kits and food this week. The charity will be launching a humanitarian response including child protection, help with shelter as the winter approaches and continued distributions of essential goods in the next two weeks.

Read the full report here.

[wvwvw]

This is why they shouldn't come to Greece. We simply can't cope.

[Wadaad]

The purpose of posting this? You think Turks are above this refugeefication process? Wait then...

[SardiniaAtlantis]

Oh God... The fact that there is even a market for this is so fucked up, the fact that the world would be set up in a way that this can happen is so wrong. That countries can spend massive amounts of money on bombs and weapons to fight wars for conglomerates, but cannot fix things to where these children won't have to live this kind of life. This is beyond sick.

[wvwvw]

The people arriving are seeking sanctuary across the continent and as such, the European Union bears collective responsibility for dealing with the crisis. We therefore encourage the EU to increase the number of relocations from Italy and Greece and to put in place a permanent system to address future emergencies. The United Nations and non-governmental organisations also have a role to play in ensuring that refugees and migrants are treated with dignity and that vulnerable children are protected.

[Trilecce]

This is why they shouldn't come to Greece. We simply can't cope.

Its your countrymen who are consuming their services. Stop exploiting children greeks! We have enough greek sex-turists in Albania, now theyve got a supply in their own country.

[Egyptian]

Perverts

[wvwvw]

Actually the majority of those who exploit children and women are "refugees" themselves and the people who are exploiting their services are also refugees. You often hear about Afghan raping Syrian girl, or another Afgan. Pakistanis raping boys and so on.