Children born in Greece allowed to cross border
10/08/2013 00:00
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By order of the Greek Foreign Ministry, until September 5th, all
Albanian children who own Greek passports will be allowed to cross the
border, regardless the language in which their birthplace is written on
the passports.
The decision has been confirmed for Top Channel by the Albanian Ambassador to Greece, Dashnor Dervishi, who added that this order has been distributed to all Greek consulates in Albania, allowing this way their passage for at least 25 days, until a final solution will be found.
The Greek side of the border has claimed in the past year that the names of the Greek birthplaces on the children’s Albanian passports are not written according to the UN regulations, since the names of places have the names how the Albanians call them. But the UN itself rejects this claim.
When contacted by Top Channel, the Spokesperson of the General Secretary of the UN, Ban Ki Mon, confirmed that no legal agreement of the UN foresees such a thing.
According to Morana Song, this issue can be resolved through a bilateral agreement, excluding the inclusion of the UN.
“The UN Legal Office declares that this is a matter of national issue between the two countries or a regional agreement that involves these two countries. The conventions on the consulate relations have no disposition on this question. For this reason, referring to the agreemenst of the UN, this matter is not foreseen by them”, the UN answer says.
For more than one year Athens has stopped the children of Albanian emigrants who were born in Greece from entering their country, giving only temporary permits on holidays or the June 23rd elections.
This matter was also part of the discussions that the Prime Minister designate of Albania, Edi Rama, had in Athens with the homologue Samaras and the Foreign Minister, Venizellos.
Top Channel
