Over 18,000 child refugees have gone missing in Europe in the last three years, according to a media collective that looked at national data. And this is likely only a conservative estimate, it said.
Between 2018 and 2020, 18,292 unaccompanied minors who had arrived on the continent as refugees disappeared from state-run facilities and asylum centers, the collective Lost in Europe, which includes journalists from the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Germany, France, Greece and the UK, revealed on Sunday.
The children came mainly from countries like Morocco, Algeria, Eritrea, Guinea and Afghanistan and were placed under state care after arriving alone, without relatives.
Children's rights organisations and experts however noted that the number of missing child migrants was likely much higher than the tally indicated.
Indeed, countries like France, Denmark and Romania do not compile data on child refugees, while Bulgaria does not differentiate between unaccompanied minors and children who arrive with their families.
The UK, meanwhile, has no centralized statistics and countries like Spain, Finland, Cyprus and the Czech Republic provided no data after 2019. Many children also enter Europe illegally and are never formally registered.
Source: CGTNNews
