Over the past weeks, the number of unaccompanied minors in transit in Rome has been increasing. They come from crisis areas such as Tigray and sleep on the street, often near the train stations. INTERSOS: “They need adequate accommodation and psychological support”
In recent weeks we are witnessing the resumption of a flow of hundreds of unaccompanied migrant minors in transit in Rome, excluded from the reception system and therefore deprived of night shelter and exposed to multiple risks of abuse and exploitation. The INTERSOS mobile health care team, in partnership with UNICEF, is working to identify and assist unaccompanied minors in meeting places, in particular near the main railway stations of the Capital. The large majority of them are unaccompanied children refugees from Sudan and from the conflict in the Tigray Region, Ethiopia, boys and girls fleeing violence and seeking safety and protection.
“Once again we are forced to denounce how the absence of dedicated protected reception facilities exposes minors in transit in Rome to unacceptable conditions and dangers – underlines Valentina Murino, head of INTERSOS child protection projects in Italy – For years we have observed the prolongation of the emergency management of a situation that is not an emergency. This management visibly reveals the hardship of the degrading living conditions and the clearings in the name of decency, such as the one that took place on 14 July in piazzale Giovanni Spadolini, behind Tiburtina Station. “What remains hidden is the vulnerability of minors who almost always carry with them deep traumas and wounds both physical and psychological. In the face of 41 clearings that have been carried out with the deployment of law enforcement in recent years at Tiburtina Station, there are zero solutions to ensure protected reception, in a situation made even more difficult by restrictions due to compliance with measures to contain Covid-19 infections”.