and he didn’t even look at the file. I was rejected. It is the same answer for everyone.”282 One of the most common “tricks” to remove applicants from the asylum procedure is that of giving the applicant the coveted red card, the asylum-seeker card widely known to be renewable at six-month intervals, together with a paper written only in Greek that says that the asylum application has been rejected and that the person has 10 days to file an appeal. Very few applicants can read or understand Greek and in their happiness and relief to receive the red card, pay little attention to the white paper with the Greek lettering. When they go back six months later to renew their red card, it is taken away because they failed to file an appeal. A 23-year-old Iraqi man from Mosul who fled from Iraq in 2007 illustrates both the problem of access to Greek territory and to being tricked out of the asylum procedure. On his first attempt to enter Greece on September 10, 2007 he was summarily expelled to Turkey after being held for 12 hours. Later that month, he succeeded in entering Greece on his second attempt, and applied for asylum as soon as he could. But he quickly fell out of the asylum procedure: I asked for asylum and got the red card and a white paper. No one explained to me what the white paper was for. So I missed the appeal of my asylum denial. When I went to renew my red card on March 23, they took it away. Now I have no paper and I could be stopped and put in jail at any time.283 Others fall out of the procedure for missing the deadlines for renewal of the red card. A 56-year-old Iraqi from Baghdad told Human Rights Watch how his son fell out of the asylum procedure: It was a Greek Christian holiday when he was denied. The government offices were closed, but he was denied because he was late and now he has been undocumented since 2002. He has been arrested four times. He is afraid to work. He can’t go anywhere else. He came here in 1998 as 282 Human Rights Watch interview (name withheld, A-47), Athens, June 3, 2008. 283 Human Rights Watch interview (name withheld, B-73), Athens, June 4, 2008. 103 Human Rights Watch November 2008