GREECE IRREGULAR MIGRANTS AND ASYLUM-SEEKERS ROUTINELY DETAINED IN SUBSTANDARD CONDITIONS 25 The chance for irregular migrants and asylum-seekers to contact their families and lawyers in order to receive appropriate assistance is hampered by the availability of card phones at detention areas and the locations where phones are situated. Even if public phones are accessible, irregular migrants and asylum-seekers with no financial means rely on the personnel of the detention centres to provide them with phonecards. According to testimonies received, there is no consistency in the authorities providing cards, and even when they do, the card has often been partially used. The ability of irregular migrants and asylum-seekers to contact the outside world is further restricted by the authorities’ practice of removing their mobile phones when they arrive at the centres or borderguard stations. In June 2009, in Samos immigration detention centre, there were two card phones inside the centre, situated in the main yard. However, the Amnesty International delegates received credible reports that the phones did not work and had not been repaired for at least a month. In the borderguard station of Ferres, the single card phone had not been working for several days when the organization visited in June 2009, and detainees had had their mobile phones removed. Furthermore, the card phone was situated in a small area outside the cells and was not accessible without asking permission from the officers in charge. In the borderguard station of Soufli, a landline phone was situated in a small space outside the area where the cells were situated. At Athens airport, a card phone is situated outside the first and second sectors of the detention facility, and detainees held in these sectors only have access to it with permission from the police. During Amnesty International’s May 2010 visit, detainees in the two sectors said that their mobiles had been confiscated by the police, and since they did not have money to buy telephone cards they were unable to contact their families. A card phone is situated in the corridor outside the cells of the third sector of the facility but detainees reported that they were rarely allowed outside the sector in order to use the card phones. As a result of the authorities confiscating the detainees’ possessions, some reported that they were unable to contact their relatives because they could not remember their phone numbers and did not have access to their address books or to their mobile phones. Local committees working for the rights of refugees on Chios, Samos and Crete, who can provide information and support to those detained, have been refused access to the detention centres and police stations in Chios and Crete, or have subsequently been provided with oral permission from the authorities to visit the local detention centre, which can be withdrawn at any time (Samos). The local committee working for the rights of refugees on Lesvos was refused access to the Pagani detention centre (which closed temporarily in November 2009). In April 2010 Amnesty International was informed that the police had denied permission for the local refugee support group on Samos to visit the centre. Prior to that, the group had been allowed access to the centre for several years, and the group’s volunteers had provided the detainees there with advice, social care and Greek lessons. In June 2010 Amnesty International was informed that the authorities had reinstated the group’s access to the centre. In February 2010, following the Greek government’s announcement about the establishment of screening centres at the country’s various points of entry, national refugee support groups and NGOs, including the Greek section of Amnesty International, signed a joint statement Index: EUR 25/002/2010 Amnesty International July 2010