Asylum applicants in EU
Interesting figures released last week by the EU reveal that in 2013 there was an increase in the numbers of people seeking asylum in EU countries, from 335,000 in 2012 to 435,000 in 2013.
It is estimated that of those, around 90% were new applicants with the remainder being repeat applicants.
In 2013, the highest number of applicants was registered in Germany (127,000 applicants, or 29% of total applicants), followed by France (65,000, or 15%), Sweden (54,000, or 13%), the United Kingdom (30,000, or 7%) and Italy (28,000, or 6%). These five Member States accounted for 70% of all applicants registered in 2013.
Syria (50,000 asylum applicants, or 12% of the total number of applicants) became, in 2013, the first main country of citizenship of these applicants, ahead of Russia (41,000, or 10%), Afghanistan (26,000, or 6%), Serbia (22,000, or 5%), Pakistan (21,000, or 5%) and Kosovo (20,000, or 5%).
According to the data, 65% of first instance decisions made on asylum applications in the EU last year were rejections, while 15% of applicants were granted refugee status, 14% subsidiary protection and 5% authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons.
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