currently pursued, are usually detained in facilities aimed at processing the removal of “illegal aliens” (Pre-Removal detention Centers/Camps), instead of welcoming forcefully displaced –and not only by war– populations. Excessive use of detention in Evros As already mentioned, upon arrival at the Evros land borders with Turkey, refugees and asylum seekers are, at first and prior to undergoing any kind of reception procedures, forced in detention. For most, however, this detainee status goes well beyond the initial waiting period for accessing (first-line) reception.37 Specifically, upon their ultimate transfer to the RIC beneficiaries are once more faced with detention, both as part of their official registration and identification, and in the context of the examination of their asylum application. This is for a number of reasons, inter alia including the overall scarcity of alternative (open) temporary accommodation facilities in mainland Greece and a similar scarcity in appropriate shelters for unaccompanied minors. More importantly, however, the RIC at Fylakio, Evros remains, up to this day, the sole RIC throughout Greece functioning under a closed doors policy. Thus, throughout their Evros-based “reception” and accommodation, applicants are either forced to remain within a closed Registration and Identification camp, or at the various police precincts and Pre-Removal Centers scattered through the region which, themselves, are closed detention facilities reserved (in theory) for those to-be-deported. In this context, timeframes of this prolonged detention, as well as the detention facility ultimately used, are both subject to issues pertaining to an applicant’s (mostly visible) vulnerabilities and their nationalities. Thus as a rule and up to the point of our visit in December 2017, the RIC at Fylakio Evros had been reserved for the detention of primarily vulnerable applicants and groups, as well as for “high recognition rate” nationalities (mainly Syrians and Iraqis). The Pre-Removal Centers, on the other hand, were used for the detention of asylum seekers belonging to so-called “low-recognition rate” nationalities (especially Pakistan) and/or for those asylum seekers whose less visible vulnerabilities had not been (properly) assessed. Based on this “allocation of spaces”, adult, vulnerable applicants and Syrian and Iraqi nationals were as a rule detained for up to the legally allowed period, in the context of their registration (maximum of 25 days). A period, following which they would either be transferred to appropriate accommodation sites (families and single-headed households) or, faced with the prospects of seemingly indefinite detention, would abstain from applying for asylum (Syrians and Iraqis), instead choosing to try their chances at protection elsewhere (usually, Thessaloniki). Unaccompanied minors, on the other hand, from an initial 3-months period of detention would, at the time of our visit (2022 December 2017), be detained for average periods of 5 to 6 months, due to ongoing Greek-wide deficiencies in the availability of suitable shelters. For the rest, –including applicants who may had been improperly assessed as non-vulnerable due to ongoing gaps in specialized, medical, personnel– the only thing changing between their registration and the completion of their asylum procedure (i.e. on average 16