Separated adolescents caught up in the Irish asylum process do not have a secure base and are in a kind of "limbo", a psychological conference was told yesterday, writes Anne Luceyin Killarney.
Tracie Ryan of Trinity College Dublin told the conference that about 1,300 children under the age of 18 and without their families had sought asylum in Ireland in 2003.
Some of these were still in the system as young adults now.
Her study of eight males and one female between 18 and 21 found that "very definitely the asylum-seeking process" reinforced feelings of being unwanted and disconnected.
They also felt abandoned even when it was their families who sent them here. They wanted their own independence, education and house and this was not available to them, said Ms Ryan.
