Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/776046
14 EUROPOL, the EU's police intel- ligence unit, estimates that around 10,000 unaccompanied children have gone missing in Europe over the past two years. In 2015 alone, nearly 90,000 unaccompanied children sought asylum in Europe and 13% of the applicants were younger than 14, travelling without their parents to the EU. Although migrant arrivals in Malta have dwindled significantly over the past two years, hundreds of unaccompanied minors reached our shores in previous years. Angela Caruana, who spent some seven years working with unac- companied migrants, describes the growing number of children who disappear as a phenomenon "which nobody wants to deal with. That was the case in the past and nothing has changed, because thousands of children go missing every year across Europe." Caruana now works at the Presi- dent's Foundation for the Well- being of Society, which later this month will be organising an inter- national conference about children who go missing, whether through sexual exploitation or migration, entitled 'Lost in Migration'. Caruana was on the age assess- ment team, which was the first to meet the unaccompanied chil- dren, who back then came by sea at great risk for their lives follow- ing a gruelling journey across the desert in North Africa after flee- ing war, violence and poverty in their home countries. "It doesn't take much to get it right, yet we keep getting it wrong. Where are the children going? Who are these children? These are invisible children who nobody cares about. Do you imagine what a Maltese family would go through if one of their children goes miss- ing? I have an 18-year-old son and at times I go crazy if I'm not aware of his whereabouts, even for a few hours. But these kids who disap- pear are mostly black or Asian, so nobody cares." So where do these children end up? To put it simply, no one re- ally knows. That's because when a child from Syria, Afghanistan or Eritrea goes missing in Europe, nothing much happens. Few secu- rity agencies file a missing person report and there are growing con- cerns that more and more children are being handed over to human traffickers and pushed into prosti- tution or slavery. Caruana, who started off as a vol- unteer at a reception centre in Sta Venera before joining what was then known as the Organisation for the Integration and Welfare of Asylum Seekers, explains that in 2007 very few countries were equipped to deal with unaccompa- nied minors. "We received specialised train- ing in human trafficking by the Italian branch International Or- ganisation for Migration," she says before recounting an encounter with unaccompanied minors who passed from Malta during a visit in the Netherlands to an open centre hosting unaccompanied minors. "During a visit to this camp, which was bang in the middle of a village and where people led a very normal life, we were given a very warm welcome by everyone. But as soon as they heard us speak in Maltese some of them started re- treating. We then found out that these were unaccompanied mi- nors who had arrived in Malta but who went missing and travelled to Europe to find something bet- ter than they had in Malta. They thought we were there to take them back to Malta, but that was not the case." But Caruana adds that this shows that the phenomenon of missing children is an indication of prob- lems which run deeper in the sys- tem. So what happened to the unac- companied children who reached Malta? "Very few are still here. In fact in preparation for the confer- ence we produced a video in which we met former unaccompanied children but it was very difficult to track them down because most of them left Malta and the few who stayed here still do not feel safe to share their experience although they have now reached adult age." Of those who managed to get out of Malta she says "I'm sure the involvement of human traffickers does not stop in Libya but some- how they do not feel safe detailing what happened following their ar- rival in Malta and how they went missing." She adds that some spoke only on condition of anonymity. "Children do not go missing just for the sake of it. I believe that no child goes missing without a plan. Some go missing because they are aware that they are granted no protection in Malta so they risk a second voyage and travel to conti- nental Europe. They do this with- out informing the authorities or the professionals around them." She explains that the vast majori- ty of unaccompanied minors enjoy temporary subsidiary protection till the age of 18. Caruana recounts that during her time working with migrant children, once out of detention many unaccompanied minors would claim that they have family members living in other European countries. After providing proof of this, which normally consisted of a phone number of their relatives they would be allowed to travel for a brief visit. "After the professionals would make a phone call and speak to the uncle in Sweden, they would be al- lowed to travel, only to never come back. Following investigations, it would transpire that the relatives did not exist. This would happen continuously, on loop, that is why the system allowed children to go missing." Authorities look at migration in numbers, and in these cases they would view the disappearance of a child as one more free bed in the open centre. Up to half of unaccompanied mi- grant children who are placed in reception centres in Europe vanish yearly, many in the first 48 hours of being placed in these centres. Some go missing from the recep- tion centres they have been placed in with a specific migration plan in mind, or run away for fear of be- ing sent back to the situation they tried to escape from. Other minors fall victim to kid- napping, trafficking, sexual ex- ploitation and economic exploita- tion, including forced donation of organs, prostitution, forced drug smuggling and begging. "Generally, when unaccompa- nied children travel to Europe by boat the human trafficker is on the boat with them, if not a trafficker would be waiting for them in the detention centre. Whenever we would raise the alarm on this, we always found closed doors from the relevant authorities." Caruana says the biggest strug- gle was not that against society and racism but against the sys- tem. "I could no longer be part of a system which was failing the unac- companied children, the system was continuously failing them." Why was it is failing them? "The children are faceless, they're just numbers, even for the people and authorities who should be protecting them. They are the invisible children." She says children living in open centres would habitually sleep till early afternoon, wake up, cook, eat, spend some time with other migrant children and go to bed again. "They are full of energy, and back then, they would be locked up in their dormitories. What would you do in their place? It's OK for a few days, but after weeks and months, they would turn the world upside down." The children who reached Malta unaccompanied, Caruana says, shouldered big responsi- bilities, because they were heav- ily indebted to their parents for helping them flee slavery or be- ing enrolled by violent gangs and militias. She explains that educational opportunities were very scarce and the only education they received was offered by volun- teers. The same goes for health services. "Then you had a few deter- mined children, who despite the complete lack of support made a success. The blame should not be put on the professionals or the Agency for the Welfare of Asylum Seekers. The people there are continuously strug- gling against the system. "The next thing these children would want is to go missing and leave Malta. When we ask former unaccompanied minors what we could have done differ- ently to help them, they all say that the system had not listened to what they were saying and had not addressed their needs. In- stead the system is set up to ease our guilt and fulfil the minimum obligations set by the EU. The services we offer to these chil- dren were never centred around their needs, they were aimed at fulfilling EU directives." Policies, she adds, must ad- dress the needs of the unac- companied child asylum seekers and give them a voice and a safe space to share their views. Instead of just observing EU di- rectives, Malta should set an ex- ample and lead the way, she says. Interview By Jurgen Balzan maltatoday, SUNDAY, 22 JANUARY 2017 When unaccompanied children travel to Europe by boat the human trafficker is on the boat with them, if not a trafficker would be waiting for them in the detention centre SMUGGLERS I could no longer be part of a system which was failing the unaccompanied children, the system was continuously failing them THE SYSTEM Failed by the system