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IMMIGRATION

Housing still scarce for refugee children

The Migration Board (Migrationsverket) is putting more pressure on Sweden's municipalities to help it cope with a major shortage of places to house refugee children.

Housing still scarce for refugee children

The agency has enlisted the help of Save the Children (Rädda barnen) and Ombudsman for Children (Barnombudsmannen) in sending letters to the country’s county governors asking them to urge municipalities to take on more of the burden.

“We have more than 500 children sitting in reception centres waiting for places elsewhere in Sweden,” Migration Board head Dan Eliasson told Sveriges Radio (SR).

“So it’s a tough situation and there is a huge need for more municipalities to take in more children.”

Currently 170 of Sweden’s 290 municipalities have signed agreements with the Migration Board to accept unaccompanied refugee children, most of whom are boys from Afghanistan and Somalia.

Roughly half of the children are between 16- and 17-years-old, while 35 percent are between 12- and 15-years-old, SR reports.

The agency estimates that a total of 2,400 unaccompanied asylum seeking children will come to Sweden this year.

The Migration Board has turned to municipalities for help in the past, but the situation hasn’t improved much.

Eliasson explained that the shortage of available spaces means many children are forced to spend up to five months living in transitional facilities.

The delay also slows down the children’s applications for refugee status, as rules stipulate that asylum applications are only reviewed once a child has received permanent placement in a municipality.

“For a young person who is naturally anxious for a decision so they can sort out their life, months seems like an eternity,” Olof Risberg, a psychologist with Save the Children, told SR.

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IMMIGRATION

France ‘will not welcome migrants’ from Lampedusa: interior minister

France "will not welcome migrants" from the island, Gérald Darmanin has insisted

France 'will not welcome migrants' from Lampedusa: interior minister

France will not welcome any migrants coming from Italy’s Lampedusa, interior minister Gérald Darmanin has said after the Mediterranean island saw record numbers of arrivals.

Some 8,500 people arrived on Lampedusa on 199 boats between Monday and Wednesday last week, according to the UN’s International Organisation for
Migration, prompting European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen to travel there Sunday to announce an emergency action plan.

According to Darmanin, Paris told Italy it was “ready to help them return people to countries with which we have good diplomatic relations”, giving the
example of Ivory Coast and Senegal.

But France “will not welcome migrants” from the island, he said, speaking on French television on Tuesday evening.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has called on Italy’s EU partners to share more of the responsibility.

The recent arrivals on Lampedusa equal more than the whole population of the tiny Italian island.

The mass movement has stoked the immigration debate in France, where political parties in the country’s hung parliament are wrangling over a draft law governing new arrivals.

France is expected to face a call from Pope Francis for greater tolerance towards migrants later this week during a high-profile visit to Mediterranean city Marseille, where the pontiff will meet President Emmanuel Macron and celebrate mass before tens of thousands in a stadium.

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