The number of underage asylum seekers in Europe is on a constant rise since 2013, while the number of those who travel without parents via informal refugee routs is also increasing. From a legal perspective, unaccompanied children must satisfy the same criteria as adult asylum seekers in order to receive international protection. However, special protection measures are imposed and special rights are allotted to unaccompanied children are as they are a particularly sensitive group. Such measures include the right to accommodation and care adapted to the child’s needs, imposition of a legal guardian, the right to family reunification, etcetera. Therefore, their age in fact constitutes the grounds for enjoying special treatment, and the age assessment is the first step in the implementation of various procedures.
The age of a child is ideally determined through his/her identity documents, but that is practically impossible to do when those children are unaccompanied asylum seekers as they usually arrive to destination countries without personal documents, birth certificates, or any form of travel documents that might serve as proof of their age. Therefore, countries have established various age assessment procedures and methods for young asylum seekers, which in some cases include controversial invasive methods such as dental examinations, x-rays, and examinations of sexual maturity. A new Council of Europe research carried out by independent experts showed that existing international and European standards are not being consistently implemented by CoE member states, while the lack of scientific methods creates the risk for arbitrary age assessment. Namely, seven of 37 member states carry out age assessment procedures which have been determined to be highly stressful, traumatic or invasive to the child and that, as such, they are not in line with international child rights standards. This is especially troubling considering that up to one third of countries involved in the research carry out these procedures regardless of whether the child or guardian thereof have given their consent.
The age assessment procedure should be carried out by qualified staff that has experience working with children, while it should also take into account the gender, culture, identity and family history of the child. However, only 19 countries sport such an approach to the age assessment procedure. Furthermore, the research has concluded that only 20 out of the 37 states respect the in dubio pro reo principle, i.e. in case of doubt, the decision more beneficial to the asylum seeker should be made.
Age assessment procedures should be applied with the aim to protect the rights of the child, as well as to protect the child from violence and exploitation of any kind, while being respectful of the principle of the child’s best interest. The assessment should not be carried out routinely, but only if the child is explicitly compliant with it, and if it is in line with his/her best interests. The procedure must be carried out by a multidisciplinary panel of independent experts with previous experience in working with children of those ethnic and cultural backgrounds, so that it could take into consideration physical, psychological, developmental and cultural factors pertinent to a decision.