exhausted and until a new agreement is signed and implemented, the RIS does not offer transport services to camp residents. Failure on the part of the Ministry of Migration and Asylum to promptly renew these contracts leads to frequent, often indefinite interruption of transport services from camps to the cities, despite the availability of EU funding. Transport services were halted for a large part of 2023. They were reinstated in January 2024 and have been suspended again from the end of February 2024 until at least mid-May. Accordingly, camp residents have no means to travel even to necessary health services or to mandatory appointments with asylum authorities e.g. for registration of an asylum application for an interview.53 Covering travel costs privately is extremely difficult for residents, as most of them are eligible for but do not receive the financial allowance as stated above. Case study: Halimo* is a refugee from Somalia and a mother of a minor child suffering from a serious orthopaedic condition. Both reside in CTRC Ritsona. After their initial asylum claim was dismissed as inadmissible based on the “safe third country” concept, they made a subsequent application. The family, however, had no means to attend the scheduled registration of their application at the Asylum Service and to visit a hospital doctor due to the absence of means of transport for residents of CTRC Ritsona. As a result, registration was postponed and all authorities involved were notified. Later, the issue seemed to have been resolved – transport to Athens was covered at least on certain days of the week – but reemerged when Halimo and her daughter had to collect their cards. They ended up collecting them from the Regional Asylum Office of Alimos by covering their travel expenses on their own. It is worth noting that the RIS has not responded to date to the requests the women filed through their lawyers for transport to Athens and for information thereon. Case study: Maryam* is a refugee from Afghanistan and a single mother of minor children. She arrived in Greece in October 2022 with one of her children after being separated from her second child that was unlawfully pushed back to Türkiye. The family was placed in CTRC Thiva and had their interview with the competent branch of the Asylum Service scheduled for mid-March 2023 at the Regional Asylum Office of Piraeus. One week prior to her interview, Maryam asked the camp to arrange her timely transfer from CTRC Thiva to Piraeus. The camp, however, informed her lawyers that “The transfer of the beneficiary and her minor child shall take place on their own means, given that there is no contract with any company for the moment and all beneficiaries of the camp travel on their own means.”. After she received refugee status at the end of April 2023, Maryam had to sign declarations under oath (ένορκες βεβαιώσεις) before a notary in Athens in order to be able to issue passports for her children. These travels were not supported by CTRC Thiva either. The problem was already known to the authorities and to EU institutions at the time the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) announced its departure from mainland camps in 53 Ombudsman, The Challenge of Migratory Flows and Refugee Protection, April 2024, 129. See also RSA, ‘In search of safety: The struggle of Afghan single mothers in Greece’, 20 July 2023, available here; ‘Refugee women in the offside’, 21 March 2023, available here. RSA REPORT │ REFUGEE CAMPS IN MAINLAND GREECE | JUN 2024 16