The coordination council for the group of CAS emergency reception centers in Turin has called for urgent solutions to help tackle the problems underage migrants are facing in Italy.
There is a lack of facilities for unaccompanied foreign minors, says the coordination council responsible for the group of CAS emergency reception centers in the northern Italian city of Turin, not far from the French border and the Alps.
According to officials from CAS, around 1,000 migrants arrive in the region of Piedmont, of which Turin is the regional capital, each week. The migration office there has reported "inadequate and prolonged waiting times" linked to their registration.
The coordinating body brings together the mangers of 25 reception centers across the region and it met on November 2 to talk about some of the issues officials at the centers are facing, when trying to help those in their care.
Minors placed in centers for adults
One of the most worrying issues, reported the mangers was that at least 30 youths had been lodged in a center meant for adults, after the closure of a center in Traves this summer. This, said the managers is because CAS centers designed for unaccompanied minors were either full or did not exist.
The managers said that the CAS emergency centers were not "adequate" to host unaccompanied minors as the facilities and services had been designed for adults, with fewer needs than young people on their own.
According to minutes from the meeting, the numbers of those waiting to be registered at the region's migration office were so high in October that people were being issued with appointments for the renewal of their residency permits for July 2024.
'Insufficient staff and structures'
The CAS coordinators blamed an "insufficient number of staff and structures" as the root cause of the problem.
Another problem highlighted was one of logistics. According to the managers, buses full of migrants were arriving from Sicily in Piedmont and "due to a lack of hubs" by which the migrants could be shared out properly, they were being left in front of the CAS shelters.
In addition, some managers said they were starting to see people arriving from the Palestinian territories, although exact numbers were not reported.