Highlights
• Children made up a quarter of the 120,560 refugees and migrants arriving in Europe through Mediterranean migration routes in 2019. Nearly 80 per cent of them were registered in Greece alone.
• In 2019, with UNICEF support nearly 19,500 children benefitted from psychosocial counselling, case management and referral. Another 5,380 unaccompanied children were also able to access community-based care, and over 24,000 children attended quality formal and non-formal education classes.
• Some 8,100 women, girls, boys and men were reached by enhanced GBV prevention and response services, while 1,760 frontline practitioners gained knowledge and skills to protect children on the move in Greece, Italy, Bulgaria, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro.
• UNICEF’s 2019 Refugee and Migrant HAC appeal was 70 per cent funded.
As UNICEF now enters its fifth year of active response, its needs amount to US$ 27.3 million to ensure that in 2020 newly arrived refugee and migrant children and their families have access to critical services, while those already in Europe have expanded social inclusion opportunities through access to education, health and protection
Situation Overview & Humanitarian Needs
Children made up a quarter of all refugees and migrants arriving in Europe through Mediterranean migration routes in 2019 (some 29,000 children). Nearly 80 per cent of them were registered in Greece alone.
Despite the overall decrease of refugee and migrant flows towards Europe in 2019, since September there has been a notable spike on both the Eastern and Central Mediterranean routes, with an average monthly rate of 8,500 and 1,600 respectively (compared to less than 1,800 and 200 respectively during the first quarter of the year).
Secondary movements in the Western Balkans also continued, leading to worsened humanitarian situations in Serbia, Montenegro, and particularly in Bosnia and Herzegovina where reception capacity and protection services remain limited. As of December, some 45,650 children on the move (including 12,800 unaccompanied or separated from their families) are present in Greece, Italy, Bulgaria and the Western Balkans.
Sub-standard reception conditions, overcrowding in first-line reception facilities, as well as limited access to psychosocial support, case management, care, protection, health, immunization and slow asylum and administrative procedures remain the most common issues faced by refugee and migrant children and their families on the ground. Despite notable progress in national legislative and policy framework related to the protection of unaccompanied children, and overall inclusion into national education systems, national capacities to respond to the needs of some of the most vulnerable children on the move (e.g. living in squats and informal settlements in urban areas, potential victims of GBV, as well as in detention or in first identification and reception centres in Greek islands) are limited, requiring additional investments and technical support.