As presented throughout this study, the Greek law stipulates that upon irregular entry into the country unaccompanied children must be placed in an overall protective environment where they should receive appropriate care, support and services. Detention may still apply, albeit only in exceptional circumstances and strictly on a temporary basis, until detained UAM are referred to suitable accommodation units of a more long-term character.

This process demonstrates that as soon as unaccompanied children are placed in detention, they obtain a unique status according to which they are not to be punished or receive moral condemnation since they were never criminals per se. Nevertheless, by inviting participants to depict the true face of detention that unaccompanied children experienced upon arrival in Greece, this study's results showed that the conditions that detained UAM were subjected to were in complete violation of the relevant legislation.

The conclusions of this research were reached by giving voice to participants and deconstructing their experiences while staying in line with the ‘double hermeneutic’ process of IPA, as presented in previous chapters, which is an approach that has not, to this day, been applied in studies that focus on the status of detained UAM in the Greek context. Accordingly, it was the qualitative tools of IPA that allowed for an exploration to occur regarding the positionality of detained UAM in Greece within the crimmigration debate, followed by an assessment on whether the right to be heard was applied correctly in the minors’ favour.

In the course of the held interviews, participants provided information concerning the hygiene issues that unaccompanied children experienced in detention, the deeply problematic detention setting, the complete lack of proper services and also referred to multiple incidents of abusive behaviour that detained UAM endured. As the interviews progressed, unaccompanied children shared their lived experiences and their responses confirmed that the protection that they were entitled to during detention was considerably challenged. Moreover, the contribution of professionals, both individually as well as in the form of a focus group meeting, corroborated the responses that had already been provided by unaccompanied children during the first interview stage and further strengthened the research findings.

Hence, it was revealed that at the time this project took place, unaccompanied children were certainly not being placed in an appropriate environment, as the law originally intended.