49. Lack of medical personnel: No doctor is permanently present in several of the camps, including Samos, Chios and Kos. The European Commission highlights this gap as “huge issue”84 and “always an issue”.85 50. Lack of interpreters: The RIS has no interpreters in the camps managed throughout Greece. Contractual arrangements with NGO Metadrasi on deployment of interpreters to the camps are yet to be concluded.86 Financial allowance 51. The provision of a financial allowance (“cash assistance”) forms part of the reception conditions guaranteed by the Asylum Code to asylum seekers as soon as they “make” their application. 52. The financial allowance (“cash assistance”) programme has been handed over by UNHCR to the Greek government since October 2021,87 contrary to the government’s submissions in para 13 of the Updated Action Plan. The handover process was marred by significant delays and resulted in an estimated 36,000 people not receiving the financial allowance by the end of 2021.88 53. Serious delays persist in the grant of the allowance in practice. The RIS updates its list of cash assistance beneficiaries every month, and a new entry onto the list needs at least 15 days to be recorded in the system. In practice, the first payment of the allowance takes place at least forty days following the registration of the asylum claim, without retroactive payment of arrears. If the person has their asylum application approved or rejected in the meantime, they never receive the financial allowance.89 54. Ministry of Migration and Asylum data for May 2023 refer to 5,120 recipients of cash assistance,90 corresponding to no more than 26.5% of the total number of pending asylum claims (19,311). Official figures therefore demonstrate that only one in four people in the asylum process receives the financial allowance. Protection of unaccompanied children 55. The Special Secretariat for Protection of Unaccompanied Minors (Ειδική Γραμματεία Προστασίας Ασυνόδευτων Ανηλίκων) referred to in para 25 of the Updated Action Plan was abolished in June 2023. Its services have been transferred to a newly established General Secretariat for Vulnerable Citizens and Institutional Protection (Γενική Γραμματεία Ευάλωτων Πολιτών και Θεσμικής Προστασίας).91 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 Al Jazeera, ‘EU details violations at Greece’s ‘model’ refugee camps’, 11 May 2023, available at: https://tinyurl.com/29xdpxbr, citing Commission documents. European Commission, Email: Visit to Kos and Leros, Ares(2023)3795420, 13 January 2023. European Commission, Conclusions of the Meeting with Sec Gen Logothetis – 07.04.2023, Ares(2023)2923660, 10 April 2023. UNHCR, ‘UNHCR hands over the management of the cash assistance programme for asylum seekers in Greece to the Greek Government’, 30 September 2021, available at: https://tinyurl.com/2xv7e7ar. RSA, ‘Refugees in Greece experience third month of humanitarian crisis and hunger’, 23 December 2021, available at: https://tinyurl.com/4cywhhtw. RSA, ‘What is happening today in the refugee structures on the Aegean islands’, 3 May 2023. Ministry of Migration and Asylum, Factsheet Μάιος 2023: Πρόγραμμα «Χρηματικό βοήθημα σε αιτούντες διεθνή προστασία», available at: https://tinyurl.com/bd52cpsu. Article 6 PD 77/2023, Gov. Gazette A’ 130/27.06.2023. 16 RSA COMMENTS│ 2023