The respondent reports that they were trying to see their children for two months and that she was not helped by the authorities

The respondent is a woman from Syria that arrived on the island of Samos in the fall of 2022. The respondent reports that it was the third time she tried to reach Greece. The first time, she was on a boat with 20 other people, some from Palestine and some from African countries, including her husband and her two children. She was six months pregnant at the time. Their boat was reportedly stopped at sea by a bigger boat and “some people wearing masks and dressed in black asked for all our passports, telephone and papers and they threw everything in the sea”. According to the respondent, they returned them to the Turkish coast, where they were met by the Turkish police and taken to a Turkish prison for 10 days. 

After this, they tried to leave to cross to Greece again, when she was 8 months pregnant, but they were found and stopped by the Turkish police in the mountains. 

The third time, shortly after this happened, she left once again from Izmir to cross to Greece in a boat with her husband, her two children and two friends. They reached the shores in Samos and started walking, but as she was heavily pregnant she was slower than the rest and “something wrong happened with [her]”. Her and her husband stayed behind while their children and friends walked faster. Her and her husband were found by MSF after 4 or 5 hours and were taken to the hospital, where she stayed for five days. She reports that she was then taken to the camp and spent three days in quarantine. She explains that when she was let out she found out that no one else from their boat, including their children and friends, had made it to the camp, and that they had been pushed back to Turkey. 

The respondent reports that their children and friends tried to cross to Greece again, and they were pushed back another two times. On the third try, they made it to Kos, instead of Samos two months later. She asked to go to Kos but she was told she was not allowed because she had a closed card [the ID card that enforces people’s geographical restriction to Samos], and they would not accept for her children to come to Samos as she cannot prove they are her children, as all the papers were taken from them and thrown in the water during their first crossing. 

The respondent reports that they were trying to see their children for two months and that she was not helped by the authorities. At that point, the children were brought to Samos, but she was still not allowed to see them until she paid 390 euros to take a DNA test. Approximately 3-4 months later, what she referred to as “public security” allowed her to see her children for two hours twice a week. She is reportedly not aware of who the children were with for all this time as they were not staying in the camp, nor with her friends since they had gone to Athens. A month later, “public security” agreed to give her the children, and now they are together in the CCAC, including the baby that was born on Samos.

The respondent reports that she did the interview for asylum before the children arrived, but both her and her husband are still waiting for a decision. She reports that she was offered the relocation programme to go to France. 

The respondent also reported that, in March, she was searched by whom she described as “a woman from the security of the camp” and that she was forced to be searched everywhere [all over her body] against her will. She reports that she was asked if she had “something” that she was hiding and she answered that she did not, that she would not as she had a newborn baby and she was a mother. She was reportedly searched in a closed room, but she felt uncomfortable as other people saw her going into the container.