Germany, Luxembourg to take in migrant children from Greece

Germany plans to take in up to 50 unaccompanied children from overcrowded migrant camps in Greece soon and Luxembourg will take 12, authorities said Tuesday.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer will propose to the cabinet on Wednesday that Germany should take in the group and “the transfer should begin in the next week if possible,” a statement from his ministry said.

The Greek government said a dozen children are expected to be transferred to Luxembourg in the coming days.

The relocation is “being achieved despite the difficult circumstances of the (coronavirus) pandemic, and has created a positive example to other European partners who have expressed their willingness to accept unaccompanied minor refugees from Greece,” Greek alternate migration and asylum minister Giorgos Koumoutsakos said, thanking Luxembourg.

There are currently over 42,000 migrants living in overcrowded camps in the Greek islands, including about 5,500 unaccompanied minors. According to the police agency Europol, around 10% of them are younger than 14.

The European Union said on March 13 that a group of member countries had agreed to take in at least 1,600 migrant children in Greece traveling without their parents. But with country after country putting new entry restrictions in place amid efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus, it has taken weeks to start putting that accord into effect.

The German interior ministry said that the children will spent their first two weeks in Germany in quarantine before being sent to various German states.

It said that, in addition to Germany and Luxembourg, France, Portugal, Ireland, Finland, Croatia, Lithuania, Belgium and Bulgaria also have said they are prepared to take in children from the Greek camps.

“Because of internal challenges" in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, "there are understandably delays in some countries at present,” the ministry’s statement said. “But Germany has the clear expectation that these countries will keep to their commitment.”