Six children aged 3 to 11 were removed from a squalid rooftop flat in the Athens suburb of Peristeri on Tuesday night after police discovered them covered in filth, living in a trash-strewn apartment without basic sanitation — prompting the arrest of both parents and a government review of why welfare services failed to intervene earlier.
Officers from the DIAS motorcycle unit raided the apartment following an anonymous tip.
The six siblings were taken to Aglaia Kyriakou Children's Hospital where medical staff and social workers are assessing the extent of the neglect. Their parents — a 37-year-old man and a 33-year-old woman — were charged with felony endangerment of minors.
A neighbour told local media he had not seen the children since last summer and had assumed the family had moved.
He described the father as increasingly "unbalanced and unkempt" but said he had neither witnessed abuse nor heard disturbance from the flat.
Minister of Social Cohesion and Family Sofia Zacharaki pledged Wednesday that the children would not be separated.
The case has ignited a national debate on Greece's child welfare monitoring after authorities confirmed the children had been absent from school and the local community for an extended period without triggering any official alert.
Government officials are reviewing how the prolonged absence went undetected by regional welfare services.