Social Work & Society ▪▪▪ A. Fili, V. Xythali: The Continuum of Neglect: Unaccompanied Minors in Greece With regard to returns, Presidential Decree 114/2010 (Art. 13) stipulates that UAM may not be expelled or returned as such action cannot provide guarantees for his/her safety. The only acceptable procedure for returning a UAM in their country of origin is that of repatriation, if there are no prosecution issues or risks. This is to take place in his/her best interest and with a view to reconnecting with the family or finding placement in suitable receiving facilities (Law 3907/2011). 3.3 Guardianship 18 Greek legislation, with Presidential Decree (P.D.) 61/1999 and the Civil Code (articles 15891654), provide for the appointment of the Public Prosecutor as a temporary guardian for UAM, who in turn has to appoint a permanent guardian. This effectively means that, for example, the only Prosecutor for minors in Athens is responsible for thousands of children. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the operation of guardianship for minors has, very rarely, been activated successfully. In fact, according to a recent European Committee for the 19 Prevention of Torture report , there is absolutely no contact between the guardian and the child, who is merely left in limbo and without access to the national protection system. In practice, Public Prosecutors, due to their overwhelming workload, delegate the responsibility for the care and protection of minors to managers or social workers at reception centers, often without officially informing them. Yet, these facilities are neither equipped nor adequately staffed to cover this gap. The provision that guardianship could be assigned to a special Social Service, is pending since 1996. A draft law on guidelines for the formation of units for the care of minors has been debated at the Ministry of Justice, ever since the M.S.S. case v Belgium and Greece. We have yet to see the results of years of deliberation. Similar to other welfare gaps, the third sector has taken on providing this service. NGO Metadrasi runs a project on the creation of a Guardianship Network for Unaccompanied Minors, which the authors were involved in setting up. In the frame of this project the Prosecutor, acting as a temporary guardian by law, provides the staff of the organization, based all over Greece, with certain powers. Their ‘duties’ include providing assistance to asylum seeker minors with family reunification claims, education and healthcare and looking after their overall psychosocial wellbeing. The project has since 2015 assisted more than 2500 UAM. However, as an NGO run project, it lacks institutional support; namely, there have been many cases where the authorities refused to cooperate with Metadrasi’s staff or hindered their access to minors. As the daily acts that require the consent of a guardian are numerous, the absence of an effective guardian, be it temporary or permanent, has implications for all aspects of the protection and exercise of UAM lawful rights, which is mainly reflected in minors’ access to asylum and education. 3.4 Access to asylum Law 4375/2016 governs minors’ access to asylum. Despite the fact that, up until 2016, very few children applied for asylum in Greece, access to the official procedure does not come without problems. To begin with, children aged below 15 may only submit an asylum application through their legal representative. In practice, these children may be barred from 18 19 http://www.legislationline.org/documents/action/popup/id/5391 http://www.refworld.org/docid/543f7ba54.html Social Work & Society, Volume 15, Issue 2, 2017 ISSN 1613-8953 ▪▪▪ http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:hbz:464-sws-1264 6