Recent Interventions
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2018
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21/11/2018 - Summary
- Citizenship determination for a child born out of wedlock by a Greek father and an alien mother without legal residence
The Greek Ombudsman received a complaint regarding problems in the process of Greek citizenship acquisition by a child born out of wedlock to a Greek father and an alien mother without legal residence, within 300 days following her divorce from her ex-spouse, also an alien. Due to the ex-spouse’s presumption of paternity, a trial was required to establish paternity. Subsequently a notarial deed of child recognition was drafted, which, however, was not accepted by the 1st Directorate of Civil Status and Social Affairs of Athens, part of the Decentralised Administration of Attica, because by that time, the child had reached the age of three, and the deadline allowed for notaries dealing with third country nationals without legal residence, had expired. The Ombudsman argued that the three-year deadline of the Immigration Code had been suspended on the grounds of force majeure (completion of the paternity trial) and the Directorate of the Decentralised Administration finally decided on the child’s acquisition of the Greek nationality. -
24/09/2018 - Summary
- Recording of civil status data for children with a single parent
The Greek Ombudsman proposed that only one parent should be registered in the case of children adopted by a single parent or children born to a single father through the surrogacy procedure, without the data of a second parent (biological parent or surrogate mother). The Ministry of the Interior accepted the Ombudsman’s proposal in relation to children adopted by a single parent. -
25/07/2018 - Summary
- Separation of newborns from their mothers due to lack of adequate identity data
The Ombudsman received complaints concerning newly born infants who were not delivered to their mothers upon their leaving hospital after childbirth, because the mothers did not have proper identification. The infants remained at hospital and were later placed in institutional care where they remained for long. The Ombudsman suggested to the Ministry of Health that they should find a way not to interrupt the infant’s biological and legal bond with the mother, by assisting the latter in the process of issuing identity documents. Law 4554/2018, which was subsequently adopted, includes regulations to record births by mothers without identification documents and register the infants within hospitals, in order to put an end to this harmful practice. -
14/06/2018 - Summary
- Reunification of alien minors, housed in a shelter, with their mother who was released from prison
A non-governmental organization (NGO), which deals with the support of prisoners and ex-prisoners, reported to the Authority that an alien mother was prevented from communicating and reuniting with her two minor children who, at the time of her detention, were housed in a child protection shelter, following the public prosecutor's order. The investigation of the case showed that the impediment was mainly due to errors and shortcomings in the entry in civil records of the two infants who were born in Greece. Another serious issue was that the mother’s deadline to leave the country had expired, which resulted in her illegal stay. Because of the above problems, the prosecutor rejected the reunification request, and the competent consulate did not issue travel documents for the family to return to their homeland.
