Specifically, the RIC (Reception and Identification Center) at Fylakio, Evros, is the sole such facility in the region and one, furthermore, whose jurisdiction extends well beyond the Evros municipality to cover the totality of the Geographical District of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace. The RIC, however, has a designated capacity of only 240 places. Accordingly, it has been consistently struggling to cope with the timely registration and accommodation of increasingly numerous arrivals during the past year; an issue which was further exacerbated at the beginning of 2018, as suffice to consider that, within the context of a continued upward trend of Evros-based arrivals since the beginning of the new year, April, alone, saw nearly 3,000 asylum seekers entering Greece’s northern borders. As a result, upon arrival and instead of being transferred to the RIC –as per the law– newcomers have, at first, been detained in one of the local Pre-Removal Centers, police precincts and/or border police outposts, while awaiting for a place to become available in the RIC, so as for the latter to become able to process them. Timeframes of this “Pre-RIC detention,” as this practice has been aptly termed, range widely, with general periods seemingly revolving around a day’s to a month’s detention.25 As per GCR’s observations in the region, however, these (pre)detention times may very well extend to two and at times even three months. That is months during which newcomers are not properly registered nor examined for any potential (and especially less visible) vulnerabilities. They are instead simply detained and left to wait in limbo, while exposed to inadequate and degrading living conditions. This, to be noted, is a practice with no grounding in law, whatsoever, and in itself constitutes a violation of the rights and dignity of all newcomers, irrelevantly of status and reasons for undertaking the perilous journey towards Europe. It is more so problematic, however, considering that the vast majority of Evros-based arrivals, as we were inter alia informed during our visit (20-22 December, 2017), are either prima facie refugees (Syrians, Iraqis) or asylum seekers.26 Lastly, it is a practice ripe with elements of discrimination, based, amongst others, on persons’ visible vulnerabilities and/or their nationalities. As per information provided by the RIS, for instance, and confirmed by both GCR’s and UNHCR’s observations in the region,27 when (pre)detained, Syrian, Iraqi nationals and more broadly “high recognition rate nationalities”, as well as families, singleheaded households and unaccompanied minors (regardless of nationality), have in general and de facto been prioritized for transfer to the RIC, in order to undergo reception.28 Thus in their cases Pre-RIC detention times have tended to end anywhere from within a couple of days to a month at most. For the remainder of third-country nationals/nonnationals, however, –including those whose vulnerabilities have not been properly assessed due to ongoing gaps in specialized, medical, personnel– Pre-RIC detention times have often exceeded two, at times reaching even three months, without their ultimate transfer to the RIC necessarily leading to the desired outcome (i.e. access to asylum). 11