ILLEGALLY RESIDENT THIRD COUNTRY NATIONALS IN GREECE: STATE APPROACHES TOWARDS THEM, THEIR PROFILE AND SOCIAL SITUATION.

Transcription

1 CENTRE OF PLANNING AND ECONOMIC RESEARCH EMN GREEK NATIONAL CONTACT POINT ILLEGALLY RESIDENT THIRD COUNTRY NATIONALS IN GREECE: STATE APPROACHES TOWARDS THEM, THEIR PROFILE AND SOCIAL SITUATION (1 ST draft) By COSTAS N. KANELLOPOULOS* in cooperation with MARIA GREGOU and ATHANASIOS PETRALIAS Athens August 2005 We would like to thank officials of Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Public Order and National Statistical Service for providing promptly unpublished data and information, as well as many colleagues for stipulating discussions. * CENTRE OF PLANNING AND ECONOMIC RESEARCH (KEPE) HIPPOKRATOUS 22 STR., ATHENS , GREECE kkanel@kepe.gr 1

2 TABLE OF CONTENTS: INTRODUCTION Executive Summary Type of material collected 1. LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND POLICY DEVELOPMENTS 2. STOCKS AND PROFILES 3. STATE APPROACHES 3.1 Measures to Prevent Illegal Immigration 3.2 Measures of Domestic Control 3.3 Voluntary and Forced Return 3.4 Measures of Rectification and Remedy Legal Status Social Services Educational Facilities Work 4. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC SITUATION, POLITICAL PARTICIPATION 4.1 Social Situation 4.2 Economic Situation 4.3 Political Participation 5. THE IMPACT OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION IN THE HOST COUNTRY 6. CONCLUSION REFERENCES ANNEX I: TABLES ANALYSED IN THE STUDY ANNEX II: INSTITUTIONS AND ORGANISATIONS ADDRESSING THE ISSUE OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION 2

3 INTRODUCTION Executive Summary Illegal immigration has taken sizeable extent in Greece since the early 1990s, when the country changed from a traditional emigration to immigration country, through massive inflow of immigrants mainly from its neighbouring countries of the then collapsed communist bloc. It is indicative that until 1998, when the first regularisation took place, the bulk of newly arrived immigrants were illegal. During the first legalisation campaign 371,641 applied for the so-called temporary white card, while only 219,024 out of these proceeded to the application for the Green card. A reasonable estimate is that 200,000 illegal immigrants abstained from the first regularisation and remained illegal. Roughly similar application figures appeared in the second regularisation (361,119) that took place in 2002, while the number of those not registered appears smaller around to 130,000. Even though both regularisation campaigns reduced the number of illegal immigrants, they did not solve the problem of illegality once and for all. The remarkable reduction of the extent of illegal immigration is evident in the fact that the number of expulsions declined drastically after the second regularisation. While in 1990s more than two hundred thousand immigrants were expelled, in the recent years these are drastically reduced to around 45,000. The evolution of illegal immigration since 2002 is not easy to document. Trade union representatives and officials from the Ministry of Public Order estimate the current stock of illegal immigrants to around 400,000. However, such a number should be considered as an overestimation. It is true that the economy until the Athens Olympic Games (August 2004) experienced a rather high growth rate, because of the preparations for the Games, as well as because of the boom in the construction sector. These activities absorbed a sizeable number of immigrants mainly those legalised through the second regularisation programme. This is confirmed by the Labour Force Survey data that show a clear increasing trend in the employed foreigners, from 145,000 in 2000 to 280,000 in Furthermore about 550,000 foreigners are secured in the main social funds, implying they are legally resident. It should be pointed out that the number of those who received a temporary residence permit was 361,110 in the second regularisation. These temporary residence 3

4 permits as well as those annual permits awarded after full examination of required documents, actually extended through successive laws for a much longer period. Thus, after the first stages of the second regularisation programme the number of those lapsed into illegality is actually relatively small and the number of those who remained illegal (taking into account asylum rejections) should be around to 150,000 persons. Moreover, because of the new arrivals of illegal immigrants it seems that the total number of illegal immigrants currently could be approximately estimated up to 200,000. Regarding the profile of illegal immigrants we use micro-data from the Labour Force Survey by identifying as illegal immigrants those unsecured. As expected, it turns out that the predominant country of origin is Albania (64%), the least developed European country. Also, most of the unsecured (illegal) immigrants are unmarried and relatively younger than the natives and even secured (legal) immigrants. Moreover, as expected, unsecured immigrants have a smaller period of residency in Greece than secured aliens. About one out of two of unsecured has been in the country for less than four years. On the other hand, a large proportion of secured (18.34%) stay in Greece for more than a decade. Due to the massive influx of immigrants to Greece since the beginning of 1990s and its complex natural terrain, Greece has undertaken, even if slowly, a series of measures to enhance its external border control. Greece has set up 58 departments of border guard with personnel of approximately guards. Also, co-operation has been established between the various police departments, responsible for detecting illegally resident aliens within the country, as well as with those responsible for passport control and the control of sea, land and air borders. Greece has signed readmission agreements with Bulgaria, France, Italy, Croatia, Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovenia. Bilateral agreements have also been signed between Greece and some of the neighbouring Balkan countries (Albania, Bulgaria) regarding seasonal work on the basis of the needs of Greek labour market. Crossborder police co-operation has been established with Bulgaria, FYROM and Albania. Last, Greece has signed with Turkey the Agreement on Combating Crime, Terrorism, Organised Crime, Illicit Drug Trafficking and Illegal Immigration, which came into force on July 17, The most recent development is the bilateral meeting, which took place in May 2005, between the Greek Minister of Public Order and the Pakistani Minister of Interior, in which several issues of common interest were 4

5 discussed with regard to the prevention of illegal immigration, drug trafficking, terrorism and organised crime. A bilateral agreement of co-operation was signed between Greece and Pakistan, the specific conditions of which are to be determined in the future. Greek state on the basis of Law 2910/2001 enhanced its measure of domestic control by stiffening the sanctions applied to those employing, carrying or providing any sort of service to illegal immigrants. The only state authority, which has the jurisdiction to check the legality of immigrants and make arrests within Greek territory is police, which has the authority to apprehend and remove illegal immigrants. There is no evidence concerning the number of individuals, either legal or illegal immigrants, returning voluntarily to their countries of origin. Despite the legal provisions concerning forced return, which have been harmonised with those of EU, there is a significant lack of legal provisions to encourage voluntary return. The majority of forced returns in recent years consistently concerns Albanians, while amongst certain other countries of origin, like Iran, Iraq expulsions represent small and declining numbers. The number of removed Albanians is close to the apprehended ones, while for certain Asian countries of origin, such as Iran and Iraq, the number of removed is much lower than the number of apprehended. The difficulty to remove illegal immigrants from the latter countries of origin discourages police authorities to proceed to the apprehensions of these illegal immigrants. In terms of the legal status of illegal immigrants, two programmes of regularisation have taken place in 1998 and Both these programmes imposed a heavy burden on administrative authorities and immigrants due to the huge number of applications, especially in large cities, and the complex bureaucratic procedure. Nevertheless, these programmes ameliorated the living conditions of illegal immigrants and they provided information regarding the extent of the phenomenon, as well as the profile of illegal immigrants. Also, the programmes paved the way for the drastic decrease of expulsions and reduced the size of illegal employment. On the other hand, it is true that Greece has not yet developed both a long-term and viable immigration policy or a permanent formal admission system of immigrants. In this respect, it is doubtful whether there are any cases of immigrant workers entering the country legally on the basis of the provisions of current legislation (Law 2910/2001). 5

6 Illegal immigrants are not entitled to any social services with the exception of emergency and child medical treatment. Law 2910 provisions stiff penalties for all those public and private agencies, which provide their services to immigrants who do not produce the required travel and entry documents. In terms of educational facilities, the children of illegal immigrants are entitled to free education, since no formal documents are needed for their enrolment. The total number of foreign pupils (including the so-called homogeneis ) from 44,000 in 1996, increased to 119,000 in The Ministry of Education has published data for the school year 2002/3, showing some 97,000 non-ethnic Greek children and 31,000 ethnic Greek children in the state school system. These numbers imply that the vast majority of immigrant children are in fact enrolled in public schools and their drop out rate should not be very high. In Greece, it is not possible for an illegal immigrant to work legally. Employment of illegal immigrants seems an attractive option for both the employer and the employee. In a country with high underground economy such an employment is as flexible as the employer needs, while the illegal immigrant is unlikely to complain whereas the legal one or native might. Furthermore, there can be additional benefits for the employer, such as avoiding social security payments completely and ignoring health and safety legislation, while the employee gets a multiple pay of what he/she could get in his/her country of origin. It is worth noting that the temporary immigration system is not widely developed. Illegal immigrants are intentionally kept at a distance from all public authorities. They are mobilised through the existing informal social networks and ethnic associations, as well as non-governmental organisations that operate as mediators between authorities and immigrants. Ethnic shops, special places for the practice of religious duties in particular neighbourhoods of mainly Athens and other large cities are used by the immigrants as places of contact and socialisation with their co-ethnics. Despite these positive aspects, there are sporadic and declining cases reported of maltreatment of illegal immigrants, especially women by their employers. Previous studies, based on the data derived from legalisation processes, have shown that illegal immigrants are generally employed in sectors displaying informal activity and unskilled labour-intensity: construction, small scale or informal business (garment), house maintenance and repairs, agriculture, housekeeping and child or elderly care, tourism, catering and street selling. 6

7 According to the recent Labour Force Survey data, a large proportion of illegal immigrants works in private households (31.27%), followed by those working in construction (29.32%). On the other hand, a rather small proportion of illegal immigrants is employed in agriculture (8.39%) and in manufacturing (9.0%). Thus, illegal immigrants are concentrated in sectors producing internationally non-tradable goods, while they also display relatively high underground activity. Their pay is generally lower compared with the pay of both legal immigrants and moreover that of natives. Despite the fact that the large immigration flows took place at periods of simultaneous rather high or even increasing unemployment of the natives, it is very doubtful whether unemployment is related to immigration especially the illegal one. Most studies conclude that immigrants are employed in jobs for which Greeks are not interested, thus functioning so far as complementary rather than substitute labour to the native one. Type of Material Collected The material studied and analysed in this report includes publications from the beginning of 1990s onward, which offer an extensive background on illegal immigration in Greece, as it was then when the phenomenon of immigration, and illegal immigration in particular, began to take dramatic proportion in relation to the native population. However, the particular attention of this report is set on the most recent publications from 1998 onwards, when the first regularisation campaign in Greece took place. A set of the published material included in this study are articles and reports published in scientific journals, or presented in conferences and academic meetings, or books and reports published by Research Institutes, such as the Centre for Planning and Economic Research (where the National Contact Point is located). These documents are easily accessible and copies of them are available. Another set of the material used includes reports on illegal immigration published by state bodies, such as Ministries dealing with several dimensions of the issue (e.g. Ministry of Public Order), as well as other organisations (e.g. Labour Institute of the Greek Confederacy of Labour). Many of these reports, especially the older ones, draw data from field research or administrative sources and make useful analyses and inferences on the basis of theory and common sense. 7

8 One of the most serious problems of research on illegal immigration in Greece, as elsewhere, is the lack of adequate, detailed and reliable data on the phenomenon. Generating data by means of field research is rather expensive while research funds are hard to find. Therefore, many researchers conduct their own surveys and due to the great effort required, they confine themselves to limited samples of doubted representativeness. Another consequence of the lack of statistical data and the limited research resources devoted to illegal immigration is that crucial dimensions of the phenomenon have not yet been examined in depth. A significant part of the material utilised by many researchers is stemming from the two regularisation programmes that have been so far implemented by the Greek state (1998, 2002), focusing on their legislative framework, the actual stage of implementation, as well as the overall review and commentary of the processes and the analysis of their policy implications. In order to avoid the above mentioned deficiencies, in this report we have mainly relied on official and as much as possible reliable data. The statistical data utilised come from the following sources. From the National Censuses, from the past regularisations, from the Ministry of Interior (regarding the number of valid residence permits), and from the Ministry of Public Order (regarding entry refusals, apprehended and removed aliens, as well as data on refused asylum applicants estimated to be still residing in the country). Moreover, the study utilises unpublished data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) of the National Statistical Service to offer new insights to the study of legal and illegal immigration. Although the available data on migration (legal & illegal) have been enriched in the recent years, it is true that many aspects of illegal immigration are not well documented. Thus, the study of these topics is not always well supported. This allows many researchers to make casual statements, without being possible to prove or disprove these statements on the basis of scientific and accurate evidence. 8

9 1. LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND POLICY DEVELOPMENTS Even though Greek legislation (L. 2910/2001, entitled Entry and stay of aliens in Greek territory, acquisition of Greek citizenship by naturalisation and other provisions) does not clearly provide a formal definition of illegal immigrants, such a definition can be derived in the context of certain articles (arts. 5, 19, 21, 50, 51, 53). As it turns out, the law does not provide a definition different than that applied in the context of Commission. More specifically, current law stipulates that any person shall be allowed to enter Greek territory only through controlled border crossings (Art. 3, para. 1) and shall be submitted to police control conducted by the local police services (Art. 4, paras. 1-2). Art. 5 specifies the documents required for legal entry to Greece for a short-stay (i.e. stay for three months in whole within a time period of six months as from the date of first entry). These documents include passport or other travel documents recognised by international conventions, and if required, a visa. Also, an alien may be allowed to enter the country to work for a particular employer and at a particular employment, if he/she has been granted a work permit by the prefect (Art. 19, para. 1). Thus in this case, work permit is a prerequisite for the legal entry of an alien, who wishes to work in Greece. Once the would-be alien worker enters the country he/she should apply for a residence permit, provided that he/she has an employment agreement and a health certificate (Art. 21). The duration of such a residence permit is up to one year and may be renewed from time to time for a period of up to one year. The stay permit is issued by the Regional Secretary General (appointed by the Ministry of Interior). Art. 51 explicitly defines as illegal immigrants those who generally cannot prove that they reside legally in Greece, meaning those who do not have a passport or other travel document or visa or a valid stay permit. Thus, it is clear that any person who does not, or no longer, fulfil the conditions for entry to, presence in, or residence on the territory of Greece is considered an illegal immigrant. In this context, the Ministry of Public Order considers as illegally present aliens those who have been found to have entered illegally (whether this be by avoiding immigration controls altogether, by employing some sort of deception, such as the use of a fraudulent document, in order to gain entry or by failing to comply with a decision to refuse or prohibit the subjects entry) and those who may have entered legally but have 9

10 subsequently remained on an illegal basis (by, for example, overstaying their permission to remain or by taking unauthorised employment). Current Greek legislation on migration does not prescribe any basic and minority rights for illegal immigrants. On the contrary, it prescribes particular sanctions against illegal immigrants (up to three-month imprisonment and a pecuniary penalty), as well as against their employers. Furthermore, the Law prohibits public services, legal entities under public law, local authorities, public benefit organisations and corporations, as well as social security organisations from providing their services to aliens, who cannot prove that they reside legally in the country (Art. 51). Hospitals, infirmaries and clinics are allowed to offer their services in cases of emergency and minor children. It is also worth noting that since 1996, minor children whose parents are illegal immigrants are allowed to be enrolled in Greek public schools and training institutes, since no documents are required for their enrolment. The most important development regarding the status of illegal immigrants in Greece is the conduct of two regularisation programmes, in 1998 and 2002 respectively, while a third one is under way. The first regularisation programme took place in accordance with Presidential Decrees 358/97 and 359/97, whereas the second regularisation took place according to Law 2910/2001. In the first regularisation, approximately 370,000 applications have been submitted, whereas in the second programme the total number of those granted temporary stay permits amounted to 350,000. As discussed in the relevant section, both regularisation programmes, radically decreased the number of illegal immigrants present in the country. At this stage it seems useful to briefly discuss some of the reasons why the first regularisation programme in Greece was introduced as late as 1998 even though a high influx of immigrants started to arrive in Greece at the beginning of 1990s. It should be pointed out that immigration was a rather new phenomenon for the case of Greece, a traditional emigration country. The reserved perception of the Greek society towards immigrants and the poor infrastructure required to cope with a substantial influx of migrants (in majority economic migrants) could not allow an earlier regularisation. In this respect, under certain conditions the optimal policy for a government might not be the immediate legalisation of illegal immigrants. The main issue is the economic impact of migrants on the host society. Certain studies have shown that the economic impact of migrants is in general positive but its distributional effects are negative for a remarkable percentage of the Greek population 10

11 (Sarris and Zografakis, 1999). The main argument seems to be that the legalisation of immigrants would increase social welfare, if they work in sectors undesirable by the natives. That is when immigrants are considered as complementary to the native workers. This condition considered to be fulfilled when legalisation took place, as a larger proportion of Greek employees were not willing to work any more as unskilled workers in agriculture, construction, and even industry. Another factor that delayed the implementation of the legalisation program was the lack of documentation and labour statistics to allow the necessary assessments. These factors might explain the stance of the Greek government the years before the first legalisation programme of 1998, with sporadic waves of administrative deportations and mass expulsions. A current legal possibility for illegal immigrants to get a residence permit is through the application procedure for the granting of asylum. This is a kind of indirect channel used by many immigrant workers, in order to buy some time of staying in the country while at the same time enjoying a minimum of rights that the status of asylum-seeker will ascribe them. The current asylum legislation provides that an alien who is in any way on Greek territory shall be recognised as a refugee and shall be granted asylum if the conditions of Article 1A of the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugee are fulfilled. In practice, this means that any alien, who enters Greek territory without possessing the documents prerequisite for his/her legal entry in the country, has the right to file an application for asylum. After the initial interview of the applicant, he/she is issued the so-called pink card, which provides all the rights ascribed to an asylum-seeker kept until a final decision on his/her status has been reached. These rights include the right to work and the right to get free medical care by the National Health System. Also, once the applicant gets his/her pink card, then he/she can apply for the issue of a work permit. In practice, due to the high number of applicants recently police authorities issue a so-called in-service note once the application has been submitted, which is kept up until the date of the initial interview of the applicant. Due to the overload of applications, the date for the interview is usually set several months after the submission of the application. Such a note actually protects the applicant from expulsion. An asylum seeker who is not granted refugee status can be granted a temporary renewable residence card of oneyear duration on humanitarian grounds. In the case of a positive ruling, the then recognised refugee is given a renewable five-year residence permit. Asylum seekers whose applications have been rejected by a final decision are given a fixed time limit, 11

12 usually three months, within which they are requested to leave the country voluntarily. After the expiry of this time limit, rejected asylum seekers will be illegally resident in Greece and can be arrested as an illegal resident. We can not imagine other ways through which an illegal immigrant can get legal status in the country. Even through marriage such a possibility seems unlikely. The general provision of law 2910 that public authorities should not offer their services to illegal immigrants implies that they cannot allow marriage of an illegal immigrant with a native. Thus, while Prefectures are responsible for the issuance of marriage permits between legal foreigners and natives; this cannot apply for the case of illegal immigrants. 12

13 2. STOCKS AND PROFILES The main difficulty in the study of stock and profiles of illegal immigration concerns documentation. Most of the existing methods of estimation regarding illegal immigration make use of various data sets stemming from different sources (administrative sources, such as ministries and local authorities, statistical services, border and police control). However the precision and reliability of such methods are in serious doubt. The difficulties derive from the fact that illegal immigration, due to its clandestinity, can only be measured indirectly through the traces illegal immigrants leave in the labour market, borders control, domestic police controls, etc. Thus, these data sets can be used only as an indication of the extent of illegal immigration and do not account for a precise measurement. The main and sole collector of statistical information related to illegal immigration in Greece is the Ministry of Public Order. However data related in general with migration can be useful when trying to measure illegal migration. The Ministry of Interior, the UNHCR, the National Statistical Service of Greece and the Employment Manpower Organisation are the main collectors of such data. The present study utilises data from the following sources. From the National Censuses, from the past regularisations, from the Ministry of Interior (regarding the number of valid residence permits), and from the Ministry of Public Order (regarding entry refusals, apprehended and removed aliens, as well as data on refused asylum applicants estimated to be still residing in the country). Moreover, the study utilises unpublished data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) of the National Statistical Service to document the proportion of illegal immigrants. More specifically LFS, as is well known, is a random nation-wide sample survey, which collects information on socio-economic features of surveyed households. Amongst other questions, such as those on country of birth and citizenship, questions on health and pension security are also included in the questionnaire, which allow us to draw information regarding the profile of unsecured or illegal immigrants. In this respect, according to the current legislative framework, legal immigrants are bound to have at least health security or both health and pension insurance. If a third country national replies that he/she is not insured, then one could consider this answer to be a clear indication of his being an illegal immigrant. 13

14 Therefore, the percentage of third country nationals who are not secured could be identified as the percentage of illegal immigrants. To the extent that this percentage is rather accurate, one can estimate the number of illegal immigrants based on the number of those immigrants holding a residence permit. Even though LFS is a rather large sample survey (about households) and by law the contents of questionnaire are strictly confidential, the main weakness of our method is that, due to language difficulties, LFS may not capture the exact number of third country nationals residing in the country. Thus, even though the profile of illegal immigrants is expected to be rather accurate, their estimated percentage is better to be interpreted as their lowest limit. Due to the collapse of the former Communist bloc, from the early 1990s onward, Greece was found in the midst of a massive flow of illegal immigrants. Throughout the nineties subsequent Greek governments had to struggle in two fronts at the same time: first, to formulate and implement a sound immigration policy and second to acquire approximate data on the extent and type of immigration into the country. After several years of mass illegal immigration, mainly from the neighbouring former Communist countries, being the last among its southern- European EU counterparts, Greece half-heartedly launched its first legalisation programme, in the aftermath of national elections in This programme was initiated after a long period of debate among political parties in parliament and generally other social groups. The central characteristics and the actual procedure will be analysed in section 3.4.1, while at this point the profile of the applicants are presented. A. Evidence from administrative official data In order to estimate the number of illegal immigrants that are currently residing in Greece, as well as the development of the stock during the past years we shall present and compare various data sets. As expected there are no official data regarding explicitly the stock of illegal immigrants. However, we would try to make such an estimate based on official data and assuming that the number of illegal immigrants is proportionally related. First, in table 2.1 the total number of aliens residing in Greece by main country of citizenship and sex as recorded in the National Census of 18/3/2001 is 14

15 presented. These data are considered as the most reliable regarding the total stock of aliens living in Greece at that time. The total number of aliens amounts to 762,191, from which 54.5% are male. Efforts were made by the Statistical Service to record all residents in the country irrespectively of their legal status. In this respect, no distinction is made regarding immigrants legal status. Thus, in this number legal as well as illegal immigrants should be included. The predominant group is Albanians (57.5%) with Bulgarians (4.6%) and Georgians (3%) to follow. There is a considerable number of aliens coming from EU-15 countries (6.2%), which should all be considered as legally residing according to Schengen provisions. In table 2.2 the number of applications for temporary residence permits that were submitted during the legalisation program of 1998 are presented. According to the Manpower Employment Agency (OAED), which was the authority responsible for receiving the applications, 371,641 applications were submitted for the so-called white card. The profile of those immigrants who applied for white card has the following structure: The overwhelming majority is of Balkan origin (78.2%), Christians (mainly Greek Orthodox and Catholic). Around 65 percent came from Albania, 7 percent from Bulgaria, 5 percent Romania, while Ukrainians, Poles, Georgians make up to 2-3 percent each. Immigrants coming from Asian countries, such as India, Pakistan, Philippines represent a small percentage of applicants that is, less than 3 percent each. Thus, one can argue that the implementation of appropriate policies on social and economic integration of migrants would not be negatively influenced by significant cultural differences between the native Greek population and immigrants. On the other hand it is noticeable that these countries are remarkably left behind in their economic, social and educational development and thus it is doubtful whether the human capital of their people fits to the needs for modern development and even corresponds to that indicated by their education. The applicants were in the younger age groups (83 percent between 20 and 44 years of age), while half of them were of married status. On the average, female immigrants belong to older age groups than male. Overall, immigrants belong to younger age groups in relation to the native Greek population. Regarding occupational distribution of immigrants, many of the immigrants did not declare in their applications an occupation. However, the majority of those who declared their occupation were unskilled manual workers (56%). Many were skilled 15

16 technicians (17%) and a remarkable percentage was skilled agricultural workers (10%). The majority (66%) of immigrants was employed in the construction sector, in private households and in manufacturing, while a remarkable percentage (20%) was employed in trade, hotels and restaurants. In terms of gender, it turns out that the percentage amounts to 74 percent of the total. However, for certain countries of origin (Pakistan, India, Bangladesh) the male percentage amounts to over 95 percent. On the other hand, for certain other countries females predominate (Philippines: 83%, Russia 75%, Moldova 74%, Georgia 63% and Bulgaria 57%). In the case of Albanians, which is the dominant immigrant national group, males amount to 82,6 percent. Recent immigrants in Greece display a rather high level of education. Of the total number, 9 percent of the applicants declared that they hold a tertiary education degree, almost one out of two have completed secondary education, whereas no less than 2 percent are illiterate. It seems that the profile of formal education of these immigrants is diversified and does not differ remarkably from that of Greeks. However, additional qualifications like the knowledge of Greek language and acquisition of training and generic skills are considered as necessary for productive employment. In terms of their regional distribution, these immigrants are concentrated in Greater Athens area (44% of the total number), in Thessaloniki and Central Macedonia (17%), meaning areas where there are higher employment opportunities and lower chances of apprehension. However these figures should be considered cautiously in view of the smaller percentage of immigrants residing in the rural areas who got registered. From this profile, one can conclude that most migrants in fact behave as rational actors: most of them are educated youth looking to improve their circumstances and not desperate people running away simply to survive. They are profoundly influenced by information about what to expect in receiving countries. It is tempting at this point to compare data of white card applications with those derived from the 2001 Census. At first sight it seems that the number of white card applicants is remarkably lower than that indicated by Census. However, excluding from the Census, the EU15 citizens (47,000), the children of aliens who are not obliged to apply for residence permit (127,000), as well as the Ethnic Greeks from 16

17 Albania and Former Soviet Union (roughly 100,000), it seems that about 488,000 third country nationals should have applied for a temporary residence permit. Given that the applications amount to 371,641, there are about 116,500 individuals in 2001 that should have applied for a white card. Approximately, 143,430 of the initial 1998 applicants for the six - month valid white card did not apply for Green cards. As a result, the number of applications for Green cards was only 228,211(Greek Ministry of Labour and Social Security, 2001). Regarding the profile of those immigrants who applied for green cards, no remarkable differences are observed compared with the above-mentioned profile of the white card applicants. A noteworthy exception is the fact that 50 percent of female white card applicants proceeded to green card application. For males this percentage amounts to 60 percent. Furthermore, as Fakiolas (2003) mentions, 219,024 applications for Green cards were approved. Moreover, until April 2001 the number of applications for renewing the annual Green card was 84,621 and the corresponding approvals 45,700. These numbers indicate the high propensity of regularised immigrants to lapse into illegality. The excessively bureaucratic system, as well as the difficulties to secure the 150 required social security stamps, mainly because of their employers unwillingness to insure them, is reported as the main reasons for such a propensity. In this context, it is worth mentioning that the social security contributions for the employee amount to between 14 and 38 percent of the nominal wage and for the employer between 19 and 48 percent depending on the kind of job and the social security fund. In construction and mining social security contributions almost double the cost of labour and thus many workers bargain on the basis of their take-home pay. In the second legalisation, which took place with Law 2910/2001, 367,860 immigrants submitted their applications for the six- month temporary residence permit and 361,110 eventually received such a permit. This second opportunity of immigrants to legalise their status was addressed to certain large groups of illegal immigrants residing in the country. In addition to those who were not registered in the first legalisation and those who had lapsed into illegality, new immigrants had entered the country, facilitated by the large informal economy and assisted by the networks established by older immigrants (Fakiolas, 2003, p. 548). However, the Ministry of Interior, who became for the first time responsible for immigration policy and the issue of work and residence permits, faced serious 17

18 difficulties to carry out within reasonable time the regularisation process. This was due to the overload of applications, mainly in the largest cities, and the heavy bureaucratic procedures required for legalisation in combination with the lack of experienced and well-trained personnel. As a consequence, the Ministry of Interior was not able to provide data on residence permits before the middle of Moreover, because there are many and long delays in entering the data in the main database, up until recently sporadically published data differed remarkably according to their date of reference. One can conclude that even though both regularisation opportunities have reduced the number of illegal immigrants in the country, they have not solved the problem of illegality. The remarkable reduction of the problem is evident from the fact that the number of expulsions declined drastically after the second regularisation. While in the 1990s more than two hundred thousand immigrants were expelled annually, in the recent years the corresponding figures are drastically lower. On the other hand, it is worth noting that in both legalisation campaigns many immigrants did not register. A main reason for this seems to be the remarkable cost incurred to registered immigrants by the relevant laws, especially the second one. Apart from the rather high social security contributions, for the provisional six months residence permit, the law required 147 Euros and the same amount for the one-year regular residence permit. Because of the rather high fees imposed on immigrants some researchers argue that the law introduced the pay-and-stayprinciple (Fakiolas 2003). Amongst them were also those who did not qualify (such as those who had penal records), or did not reside illegally in Greece before the specified deadlines, or did not plan to stay in Greece for long or even preferred the flexibility of the informal labour market. The main question that arises is how many illegal immigrants did not apply for regularisation at the second programme; that is, the actual size of illegal immigration in the country in Taking as benchmark the Census data of 2001, which records the number of foreign population by nationality and subtracting other groups, it is estimated that about 130,000 irregular immigrants did not apply for regularisation in the 2001 regularisation campaign. It is worth noting that other researchers (Fakiolas 2003, Lianos 2003, Baldwin-Edwards 2004) provide higher estimates, over 200,000. However, they do not consider aliens children (not obliged to apply for residence permit) in their calculations. 18

19 The Ministry of Interior provided data concerning the total number of residence permits that were in effect at by country of citizenship and sex. Former data are not available from the Ministry, since the database was not adequately developed earlier. These data are presented in table 2.3. The total number of residence permits in effect at the end of 2003 amounts to 721,883. Taking into account that this number corresponds to third country immigrants, it is above the respective number recorded in the National Census of 2001, signalling a significant reduction in the number of illegal immigrants residing in the country at the end of Furthermore if we observe the number of valid third country residence permits at 31/12/2003 for females (that is 245,857), it is lower than that of the Census (318,564). This result is due mainly to Albanian female immigrants, to whom 108,225 residence permits have been issued, while in the Census 180,887 individuals are recorded. On the other hand, for the case of males the residence permits (476,000) are remarkably higher than that derived from the Census (400,000). The conclusion that the number of illegal immigrants has declined should be taken with reservation. More specifically, more recent data provided by the Ministry of Interior estimate the number of valid residence permits at the beginning of 2004 to about 420,000 persons. Unless the observed extensive decline of the valid residence permits is due to the expiration of residence permits at the end of 2003, our calculations cannot be very reliable. On the other hand, such numbers do not necessarily capture the number of legally residing in the country aliens, because successive laws automatically extended the date of expiration of the residence permits until June A data source that allows the elaboration on the development of the stock of illegal immigrants comes from the Ministry of Public Order. In tables 2.4, 2.5 and 2.6 in the appendix the number of removed aliens, the number of apprehended aliens and the number of refused aliens at the border, all by main country of citizenship and by type of border, for the period are presented. The development of these variables through the years examined signals the trend of the stock of illegal immigrants during the same period. Aliens refused at the border have been considered by many studies as the most reliable variable to estimate illegal immigration, on the assumption that illegal immigration is a constant percentage of border refusals. Moreover apprehended aliens have also been considered as a significant variable, since one could assume that a 19

20 constant percentage of illegal immigrants are usually apprehended. This however is not as straightforward hypothesis, since this proportion is analogous to the police efforts to apprehend illegal aliens. Sources of the Ministry of Public Order argue that such efforts are neither intense nor constant. The main reason for this is the legal and administrative difficulties to carry out removals of those apprehended. Moreover it has changed through time, as a result of the increasing share of illegal immigrants originating mainly from Asian and African countries who is rather difficult to repatriate. Thus, the observed reduction in the number of apprehensions can not serve as evidence for the reduction in the number of illegal immigrants. Furthermore, while removed aliens are a part of those apprehended, they can not be taken as a basis to calculate the stock of illegal immigrants, since their size is mainly affected by administrative expulsion decisions and co-operation with the countries of origin so as to receive back their natives. Refused aliens (table 2.6) show a clear decreasing trend throughout the examined period. From 24,162 in 2002, they declined to 17,642 in 2003 and 14,584 in This amounts to a reduction of 39.64% in the number of refused aliens within 2 years (from 2002 to 2004). This might be related to the stricter allowance of visas from Greek Consulates in the countries of origin, as well as to the implementation of the Schengen Convention, which implies more careful passport control. Apprehended aliens (table 2.5) are also decreasing from 58,230 in 2002 to 51,031 in 2003 and 44,985 in 2004, a reduction of 22.75% within two years. Furthermore, it is worth noting that the decline of about 13 thousands includes a reduction of apprehended Iraqis by 7.5 thousands and Iranians by 1 thousand. Taking into account the lower number of removals of Iraqis and Iranian nationals, it seems that these apprehensions very probably declined because of the difficulties to remove these particular categories of illegal immigrants and not necessarily because of a reduction in their stock. The total number of removed aliens (table 2.4) is also decreasing from 49,310 in 2002 to 45,112 in 2003 and 39,842 in 2004 (a reduction of 19.2% within 2 years). The downward evolution of these 3 variables, especially of the number of border refusals, allows us to assume that the stock of illegal immigrants is unlikely to increase remarkably during the period. Another important observation derives from the number of rejected asylum applications during the recent years. In table 2.7 the decisions on asylum applications 20

21 over the period are presented. The first observation is that the number of applications increased significantly during 2003, while decreased in half in These fluctuations do not allow us to make any assumption on the trend of this variable. The main characteristic is the rejection of the vast majority of the applications made. During the last 4 years 19,026 applicants were rejected. It is very likely that a large proportion of rejected asylum applicants is still residing in the country illegally, since the expulsion in many cases cannot be implemented due to administrative reasons, costs of transportation and refusal of the countries of origin to accept them back. In order to make roughly an estimation of the stock of illegal immigrants during the period we proceed as follows. First, on the basis of comparison between the National Census and the applications from the first legalisation programme it turns out that 116,500 illegal immigrants did not apply even for a white card in If however we consider the much lower number of green card applicants and the fact that those who got such a card did not necessarily renew it, it becomes clear that the number of illegal immigrants in 2001 should be estimated around to 300,000 persons. This number is consistent with the number of applicants of the 2002 regularisation campaign i.e 367,800 applications. Second, by making a similar comparison between 2001 Census and the number of applications for the second legalisation programme, it is estimated that the number of illegal immigrants, who did not apply for legalisation in 2002, is about 130,000, roughly the same to that of the first. It should be pointed out that out of these applications, 361,110 did actually received temporary residence permit. These temporary residence permits, as well as those annual awarded after full examination of required documents, actually extended through successive laws for a much longer period. The main reason for these successive extensions was the inability of responsible authorities, especially in large municipalities, to examine the enormous number of initial or renewal applications. Thus, after the first stages of the second regularisation programme the number of those lapsed to illegality is actually relatively small and the number of illegal immigrants should be around to 130,000 persons. Third, we also know from the Ministry of Public Order that the number of refused aliens decreased by 26.98% from 2002 to 2003 and by 17.33% from 2003 to 2004, that is from 24,162 in 2002 to 14,584 in On the other hand, the period were preparation years for the Athens Olympic Games, which attracted 21

22 many immigrant workers in the construction and public works. These workers however were overwhelmingly legal and secured, mainly through the second legalisation. In this respect it is indicative that according to the Labour Force Survey while in ,000 foreigners were employed in the country, in the first quarter of 2004 the number amounted to nearly 280,000 (table 2.8). While it is not clear whether this increase reflects a genuine increase in the number of immigrants (both legal and illegal) or an effort of the LFS to capture foreigners more accurately, it seems that the stock of immigrants did not decline until The weakness of the LFS to capture the accurate number of employed foreigners is shown when we consider the number of foreigners insured in the main social funds. In the main social security organisation (IKA) in October 2003 there were 505,000 foreigners insured (out of 1,900,000). Furthermore, 45,000 foreigners are insured in the Agriculture Social Fund (OGA) and around 15,000 in the Merchants Social Fund (TEVE). That is 570,000 foreign workers are secured in Greek social funds, which implies that their status is legal. Thus, foreigners already represent a significant percentage out of total employment, which is estimated to 4,300,000. Furthermore during the period the rejected asylum applications amounted to 19,000. Thus we can infer that the stock of illegal immigrants during the period increased by that number, so the number of illegal immigrants is estimated at 2004 at least 150,000. Moreover, because of the new arrivals of illegal immigrants it seems that the total number of illegal immigrants during the period is estimated to be up to 200,000. It is common knowledge that after the Olympic Games, with the completion of related public works and the contraction of the construction sector, the number of immigrants, both legal and illegal, declined remarkably. Thus we consider as the upper limit of current illegal immigrants to be that estimated for the previous years that is, 200,000. B. The Profile of Illegal Immigrants The data used in order to present the profile of illegal immigrants come from the Labour Force Surveys of the second trimester of 1999, 2000 and 2002, which records the health and pension insurance fund of each surveyed individual. In order to increase our number of observations we unified the records of the three years. We 22