Advance Relief Efforts for Refugees in Greece

Today, we are delighted to share our Annual Report for 2020 with you. The report covers the work we've been able to accomplish throughout the year in Ritsona Refugee Camp, Lesvos, and Athens, thanks to your generous donations. 

Over the past year, our teams adapted programming to the extraordinary circumstances of the pandemic, including: 

• The Youth Engagement Space launched its Online Youth Space in April, providing workshops (including language, arts, and sports), as well as psychosocial support remotely. 
• The Child Friendly Space shifted its programming to focus on three and four year old children - who otherwise have no access to early childhood development activities.  From October through December, the CFS provided a safe environment for 69 children to play and socialise per week.  
• We launched a new, formalised version of our Resident Volunteer Programme, engaging members of the community in our programming, and ensuring that it is accountable to the community. In the second half of the year, we offered four trainings, including in Child Protection and Conflict Resolution, and inducted 11 Resident Volunteers. 
• After suspending our programming on Lesvos, we launched a Streetwork project in Athens, providing holistic support to asylum seekers and refugees experiencing homelessness. In the pilot phase, we supported 145 families and individuals experiencing various forms of homelessness.

We started this project in 2017, as the situation for refugees in Greece was fading from the world’s attention. You stepped up to provide vital support to us at the most pivotal moment. Through the years, you have made it possible for us to achieve so much - to launch multiple editions of the Ritona Kingdom Journal; to start our Resident Volunteer Programme; to provide support to people seeking safety on the north shore of Lesvos, upon their arrival, and at Stage 2 Transit Camp, especially when arrivals increased dramatically in the summer of 2019. 

Today, we are closing this project in order to focus our efforts on our current GlobalGiving campaign, which addresses the most current and pressing needs in Greece. Your monthly donations are still very much needed, and will be carried over to our current project “Critical Support for Refugees in Greece”, and will continue to support our programming, offering relief to asylum seekers and refugees in Ritsona Camp and Athens. 

We have come a long way, and achieved some amazing things since launching this campaign, but there remains so much to be done. The recent pandemic has only highlighted the severe injustices which forcibly displaced people face every day in Greece, including tenuous access to housing, education and healthcare. They continue to wait for increasing periods of time for their asylum requests to be processed, many in camps now surrounded by walls, and once their refugee status is recognised, they find themselves without any support after only 30 days, having to navigate complicated Greek bureaucracy to access their basic rights. 

Lighthouse Relief continues to shine a light of compassion, providing dignified, sustainable and accountable support to the most vulnerable asylum seekers and refugees. We couldn’t have gotten this far without your support. But there is still further to go.

Sincerely, 

The Entire Team at Lighthouse Relief 

Links:

• Read Our Annual Report
• Watch a Glimpse at the Past Year