Nearly one million people applied for asylum and international protection in the European Union in 2022, according to data released today (Wednesday), bringing the number of asylum applications to a level not seen since the refugee crisis of 2015-2016.
The EU Agency for Asylum Seekers said that last year 966,000 asylum applications were submitted in the 27 EU countries as well as in Norway and Switzerland. This is an increase of 50 percent from 2021. This number does not include more than 4 million Ukrainian refugees who received “temporary protection” in EU countries – a special route that was activated to avoid the collapse of the systems for accepting refugees.
The European agency linked the increase to the continued easing of the corona restrictions on travel, the increase in food insecurity and the increase in violent conflicts in many regions of the world. Although most asylum seekers enter the EU legally, mostly by flight with travel visas, some have also crossed the EU’s land and sea borders without permission, mainly via the Western Balkans and the Mediterranean.
After more than a decade of war and economic collapse in their country, Syrians continued to be the main group of asylum seekers in Europe, with more than 130,000 applications. Not far behind them are the Afghans, with 129,000 requests, who fled the security, humanitarian and financial problems developing in their country, following the Taliban takeover in August 2021.
In third place came refugees from Turkey who doubled their number with 55,000 applications. Rising inflation and “democratic retreat” were among the factors that caused the increase, according to the agency.
In many places in Europe the reception centers are flooded leaving the asylum seekers on the streets. The recent earthquake that killed nearly 46,000 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless in Turkey and Syria has raised fears of a possible spike in irregular border crossings to Greece. Germany earlier this month offered to temporarily ease visa restrictions for some earthquake survivors, while Spain promised to resettle a small group of 100 Syrian refugees who arrived via Turkey, home to 4 million refugees.
Venezuelans, Colombians, Bangladeshis, and Georgians sought asylum in record numbers last year, as did Moroccans, Tunisians, and Egyptians, with about 4% of asylum seekers in 2022 claiming to be unaccompanied minors. The European agency did not say which EU countries received the most applications last year, but an internal EU migration report obtained by the AP lists Germany, France, Spain, Austria and Italy as the top five.
Asylum authorities made decisions on more than 600,000 applications last year, but the number of new applications received is even greater. Of the applications analyzed, 40% received refugee status or secondary protection, mainly for Syrian, Belarusian, Eritrean, Yemeni and Malian applicants, as well as for the majority of Ukrainians who chose to apply for asylum instead of temporary protection.