In search of safety: The struggle of Afghan single mothers in Greece

In search of safety:

The struggle of Afghan single mothers in Greece

Refugee single mothers face aggravated challenges and protection risks in Greece. Many have experienced family separation, as well as risks of exploitation and gender-based violence, physical harm and injury. These cause additional psychosocial stress and trauma prior to reaching Greece and thereafter. Their children are also at higher risk of physical or mental harm.

Refugee Support Aegean (RSA) spoke with six mothers from Afghanistan who described their situation, their specific protection risks but also their strength. RSA has undertaken legal representation of all these women. All except one arrived in Greece during the winter 2022 through the Evros land border. They are currently living in Controlled Access Centers (camps) on the mainland, but faced homelessness or unsafe environments upon arrival in Athens.

Single mothers spoke to us of the challenges they faced while trying to adjust to a new role now serving as head of the family and sole caretakers for their children, which further deepens their need for protection and support. They highlight their first priority towards finding, at last, safety for their children and themselves. They describe their traumatic experiences during their journeys towards Europe. Feeling now stuck in remote camps, trying to cope with their asylum claims’ processes and processing custody issues with no information, without sufficient services and without receiving promptly the entitled cash assistance, they speak of their own journey towards integration in the society. They deal with the need to work and at the same time proceed with all their obligations, while lacking safe children-friendly places. However, despite all the hardships, their voices also reflect their strength and hope for a normal life, for their children and themselves.

We should also note that there are no available numbers of single mothers among asylum seekers and refugees in Greece. Statistics released by the Ministry of Migration and Asylum only contain a breakdown of asylum applicants by gender, age and nationality. Its Reception and Identification Service (RIS) provides statistics on single-parent families in general, available up to the end of September 2022.^[1]

Being both parents at once, “lawyers” and breadwinners for the family

Single refugee mothers we spoke to and their children have all escaped Afghanistan and faced family separation in their home country, in transit or in Greece. In some cases, their husbands have passed away or disappeared. In other cases, these women got divorced or escaped abusive relationships.

They have been single parents for periods ranging from four months to five years. All of them still struggle to adjust to their new roles and responsibilities. Coming from a country where men are considered the “breadwinners” and legal representatives of the family and where women are usually not allowed to work or even attend school, they find themselves confronted with a new reality in Greece. They have to be effective advocates for their families in their asylum procedure and at the same time good mothers. They have little time and energy for themselves to reflect on and process past experiences and trauma.

At the same time, they have to cope with the cultural shock stemming from sudden confrontation with different perceptions of gender roles, family, rights and the law.

Searching for safety

Many of the women we spoke with were exposed to homelessness and/or unsafe environments upon arrival to Greece.

A safe place and protection from deportation are currently the most pressing concerns for their families. The women speak of safety in terms of protection from any form of forceful return, but also as prompt access to a fair asylum procedure with decent living conditions.

All of the women we spoke with reported efforts to regularly visit psychologists. At the same time, many suffer from different physical illnesses that affect both their health and their ability to act as heads of their families. Despite this, the women put the well-being of their children before their own health. They explain that the lack of sufficient services for asylum seekers in the camps creates further obstacles in accessing their families’ rights and basic needs. This reality highlights the pressing need of specialised support infrastructure for single mothers, almost absent in Greece.

Reaching Europe comes with more trauma

All of the women we spoke to had to irregularly reach Greece, due to the near-total lack of safe and legal pathways to Europe for refugees. Most have reported to us that they experienced illegal forced returns (push backs) on different occasions and in different locations throughout their perilous escape to Greece, often resulting in separation of their family and even in disappearance of their loved ones. The trauma inflicted on them by these human rights violations lives on today.

Stuck in remote camps, trying to cope with their asylum claims’ processes

As Refugee Support Aegean (RSA) reported earlier this year in two relevant publications (1, 2), services have been highly limited inside the camps, especially after the departure of the International Organisation of Migration (IOM) on 20 March 2023. Legal advice, psycho-social support as well as language classes and transportation services were radically reduced if not completely cut off. At the same time, since early February there have been serious gaps in interpretation services in the camps. There is neither provision for specialised medical services inside the camps (i.e. psychiatrists, paediatric care or gynaecologists) nor for prescribed medication. Single mothers living in the camps describe their problems related to access to public health services, transportation costs and translation services.

Moreover, delays in the registration of their asylum claims directly affected their access to monthly allowances. In one case a woman has not received any financial assistance since she arrived in Greece more than six months ago, while others had to wait for several weeks. As a result, they cannot cover basic needs for themselves and their children, while they face obstacles in reaching any form of support services in Athens as they lack the financial means to cover the transportation cost.

After finding shelter in a camp, they had to wait for a few weeks or even months to finally register their asylum applications, receive proper documentation and thus protection from arrest and detention.

For example, Arezu* from Afghanistan, aged 33, single mother with three children aged 13, 9 and 3, tells us her story. She arrived in Greece four years ago, together with her husband, but he abandoned them once in Greece. In winter 2022, she got a rejection decision on her asylum claim, based on the application of the “safe third country concept”, and managed to submit a subsequent application five months later.

Obstacles for integration and custody

The mothers who spoke to us explained that they can go to Athens for legal, social or health services only during the hours when their children are at school. Those that have babies or toddlers have to take them with them. Transport costs from remote camps to the city are not covered by the state.

These limitations often hinder the women in attending appointments with psychologists, hospitals or their lawyers, or even mandatory asylum interviews. Asylum Service offices such as in Piraeus - responsible for Afghan refugees - do not offer a child-friendly space for single parents to leave their children until they conclude their appointment.

Another major concern for single mothers is securing custody of their children. Conditions in their home countries and along the journey often mean that critical civil status processes have not been conducted and that documents such as family books, divorce acts, death certificates or custody rulings have not been obtained or got confiscated, stolen or lost along the journey. To apply for travel documents for their children, for instance, single parents have to produce either a notarised sworn declaration of their family status in the home country (ένορκη βεβαίωση) or custody ruling by a Greek family court.

The departure of IOM from the camps in 2023 has left critical gaps in information on family law issues. None of the women we spoke to was aware of the custody procedures or of their right to apply for free legal representation to the Greek state.

Empowerment of the women and hope for a “normal” life

While facing great hardships in order to fulfil their obligations as parents, all mothers report that their greatest wish is to see their children happy and calm living a “normal life”, something they themselves never had.

Single mothers think of their problems all day, throughout their daily lives, but upon being asked to reflect on the hardships they already survived from, their strength shows up in their troubled faces and they smile.

* Names of persons cited in this news have been changed to protect safety and privacy.

With the important contribution of the photographer and artist Marily Stroux, who did the illustration, we visualised the stories you read in this text, through 9 sketches that capture what the women told us in their conversations with us. You can see the sketches in the slideshow below

(click the images to enlarge)

Notes

1. Latest statistics published by the Identification and Reception Service on the first nine months of 2022 referring to the vulnerable groups identified upon registration of the asylum claim account for 426 single parents (out of 18,046 referrals / 2.4%). Meanwhile recent numbers on asylum applications in the first quarter of 2023 state that 23% of the 12,875 asylum registered asylum applications are female applicants (of all ages). See here. ↑
2. The Emergency Support to Integration and Accommodation (ESTIA) programme implemented since November 2015, provided decentralised housing to vulnerable asylum applicants in Greece through rental of property. The programme was fully handed over by UNHCR to the Ministry of Migration and Asylum in January 2021, and was terminated at the end of 2022. See here. ↑