Migration call center for Ukrainian refugees gets 350 calls a day

Ellinikon-Argyroupolis municipality and village in northern Greece welcome Ukrainian refugees.

A call center for displaced Ukrainians in Greece set up on March 3 by the Greek Migration & Asylum Ministry is receiving some 350 telephone inquiries each day, the ministry said in tweets on Tuesday, including at least 50 calls on weekends and holidays.

The call center is staffed by the ministry, its asylum service, and NGO ‘Metadrasi’ as well as Ukrainian embassy volunteers, it added.

The center is part of an effort by the ministry to help Ukrainians fleeing the war in their country to apply for various kinds of help, and its platform at https://migration.gov.gr/en/ is constantly added to with new services, including an upcoming registration for appointments to get temporary residence and identification papers. The help is offered in English and Ukrainian.

In addition to help for the refugees, the platform also offers an opportunity for Greek citizens to sign up to host refugees or to provide humanitarian help (“Help Ukraine”).

The ministry said that the five most common questions asked by phone include how to apply for temporary protection; how to get help for health issues and basic goods; how to find a place to stay; how to register children in schools; and issues related to Covid-19 vaccination.

Ellinikon-Argyroupolis municipality and village in northern Greece welcome Ukrainian refugees

Mayor of Argyroupolis-Ellinikon Giannis Konstantantos welcomed refugee families who had arrived from Ukraine a few days ago at the municipal headquarters on Tuesday.

The municipality has been hosting the war-fleeing families, which include children with hearing impairments; the latter are already enrolled in the municipality’s special learning school since last Friday.

In a statement, Konstantatos said that the municipality “was created by people who fled a war,” and that they “restarted life, culture and their traditions right here,” explaining that he was referring to Pontic Greeks, refugees from the Black Sea region of Asia Minor. He also thanked Lamda Development CEO Odysseas Athanasiou for the company’s financial support in hosting the families.

Pella region

Meanwhile, according to AMNA, three Ukrainian women from Kharkiv and Nikolaev with their children have been welcomed at the village of Tsaki, in the municipality of Almopia, in the Pella region of northern Greece. Children from the local primary school welcomed eight Ukrainian refugee schoolchildren with Pontic songs, while a third-grader whose initiative it was played the traditional Pontic lyra (kemenche).

The initiative to host them in the village came from the local priest and his wife, who is of Ukrainian origin, aided by the Pella educational directorate for grade schools, represented by its director Nikos Angelidis, who told Athens-Macedonian News Agency that “teachers welcomed children with love and (regional) families opened their homes for them.”

Greek foreign ministry condemns terrorist attack in Beersheba

Greece unequivocally condemns the terrorist attack against Israeli citizens in Beersheba on Tuesday, tweeted the Greek Foreign Affairs Ministry on Tuesday.

The ministry also expressed “sincere condolences to the victims’ families and wishes for speedy recovery to the injured. We stand firmly in solidarity with the government and people of our close friend and partner Israel.”