GFR’s Annual Review 2025 is now available.
As in previous years, 2025 was not easy, but it was even harder to be a refugee- and migrant-led organisation in Greece. Policies hardened toward deterrence. Public debate turned more hostile, with rising hate speech and scapegoating, while mainstream media largely shut out refugee and migrant representatives speaking about us, not with us. The space for civil society, especially refugee-led groups, kept shrinking in an openly hostile and threatening climate.
But needs did not shrink. People kept arriving, and families were pushed into homelessness and deeper vulnerability. Returns from other EU countries, especially Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, increased, with many people coming back to Greece with no reception plan, no housing, and no clear pathway forward. In closed controlled facilities, we kept hearing the same questions: “Why are we detained?” and “Where can we go now?”
In this reality, GFR did what we have always done: we stayed present. We kept our office open as a daily community hub, organising, listening, documenting, and turning lived experience into action. GFR is a refugee-led association and network of refugee and migrant communities founded by refugees, with refugees, for refugees. Every day, we connect community members and newcomers to reliable services, partner NGOs, and their communities, helping people navigate bureaucracy and limited access safely.
What’s inside the Annual Review 2025:
This report brings together selected highlights from our work across Greece and Europe, including:
- Community hub & daily bridging: community meetings, workshops, rights awareness, referrals, and ongoing support for newcomers and community members
- Women & vulnerability, HARTS: a safe space for women and girls, self-organised groups, psychosocial support, skills and visibility, and pathways into leadership and participation
- Democracy4all (Self-advocacy & political inclusion): strengthening representation, meaningful participation and community leadership pathways
- Rights & evidence-based advocacy: raising key concerns around asylum access, border procedures, detention, and accountability grounded in lived experience and realities on the ground
- Solidarity & crisis response: Food for All distributions and donation mobilization for the most vulnerable groups
- EU projects & partnerships: contributing lived-experience perspectives in EU-funded projects (AMIF/CERV/Erasmus+/others) and preparing future proposals and partnerships for the years ahead
- A learning and exchange hub beyond Greece: volunteers, interns hosted continuously, and study visits – learning realities from lived experience, not from theory
Read or Download the full Review HERE
Support refugee-led leadership
Refugee-led organisations are often asked to deliver more with fewer resources, while also carrying the costs of compliance, transparency, and the daily community hub that makes real impact possible. If you would like refugee-led leadership to remain present in Greece and Europe, as a partner, an accountability voice, and a bridge between communities and institutions, we would be grateful to connect.
Contact: info@refugees.gr