In an out-of-sight flat in one of Athens’ poorest districts, dozens of migrant women and young children left exposed by Greece’s dwindling asylum support programmes queue for food donations.
Deniz Yobo, a 33-year-old woman from Niger has picked up enough rice, lentils, flour, honey and biscuits to fill her kitchen cupboards for the coming month.
A mother of two raising her children alone, Yobo saw her meagre salary all but wiped out this year by the soaring cost of living in Greece.
Working as a part-time cleaner, she earns less than 500 euros ($550) a month, which is just enough to pay her 350-euro rent.
“Often, halfway through the month, I no longer have enough money to feed my sons,” she told AFP.
Greece has been steadily slashing benefits offered to asylum seekers and refugees amid a toughening attitude towards migrants across Europe.
Finance assistance of a few hundred euros (dollars) per month ends once an asylum seeker is granted refugee status.
In December, Athens terminated a European Union-funded programme that had offered rented housing to tens of thousands of refugees over the past seven years.
“The programme has completed its mission,” the then migration minister Notis Mitarachi said at the time, adding that the “few” claimants had been taken to “modern” camps.
Fahima, an Afghan woman in her twenties, was among those dumped on the street by the move.
After several months, she and her mother were able to find accommodation in a small studio with another eight people.
Fahima, who has been in Greece for the past six years, has had her asylum application rejected.
