In this study, Save the Children examined the protection risks for children on the move along their migratory journeys, with a focus on routes between Sudan and Egypt, Libya and Greece, as well as on the North-Western Balkan route. It draws on interviews with children, their caregivers, and practitioners collected between February and October 2025. The study aims to capture a comprehensive picture of the physical and psychological harm experienced by children on the move and analyses how they are at risk of repeated and sustained exposure to harm. So far, there has been limited research on the impact of these harmful events on children, which emerge at different points, i.e. along the entirety of their journey. This repeated exposure to harm before and during departure, in transit and at the arrival in a destination country, can have compounding adverse effects on the wellbeing, (mental) health, cognitive and emotional development of children.
Following this route-based approach, the study subsequently considered how EU migration policies either sustain, contribute to- or mitigate these protection risks. The EU’s external migration actions have a critical role to play – not only in managing irregular movement, but in upholding children’s rights and strengthening protection standards and service delivery along migration routes. As shown throughout this study, outsourcing migration control to neighbouring countries has too often meant outsourcing risk and harm, with children’s rights and well-being overlooked. Instead of treating these countries as buffer zones, the EU and its Member States must commit to genuine partnerships that put child protection at the center . This means investing in dignified reception, guardianship, and asylum systems, and putting a permanent end to pushbacks, detention and deportations that strip children of their rights.