Towards Semantically Conscious, Conversation-Based Chatbot Services for Migrants

Many EU countries continue to face significant societal challenges related to the acceptance and integration of Third Country Nationals (TCNs). On one hand, hosting countries need to develop efficient and transparent processes to ensure quick registration, health assistance, integration, and support of TCNs. On the other hand, TCNs often face difficulties finding information about the hosting countries, e.g. about public services, reception centers, migration policies and asylum procedures. This paper presents ongoing work towards the development of SALLY, an intelligent chatbot to assist the information seeking process for migrants, supporting their reception and social integration in Greece. The framework aims to combine a multitude of state-of-the-art technologies on Large Language Models, Dialogue Management, Knowledge Graphs, Sentiment Analysis, and Information Retrieval, to achieve personalized conversational awareness and assist migrants in acquiring information relevant to their needs. The support of the Greek language, which is a low-resource language, and the interaction with the users through smart dialogues, beyond simple question-answering, constitute two key objectives of the framework.