The number of asylum seekers in the European Union increased by more than 50% in 2022 compared to the previous year, Director of the European agency for asylum EUAA Nina Gregori noted.
According to her, during the first 10 months of the year 2022, the EU has received almost 800 thousand applications for asylum, which is 54% more than last year.
This number does not include citizens of Ukraine moving to EU countries after the beginning of the Russian military invasion. They are not granted political asylum, but temporary protection status, and they are not included in the statistics on refugees. The list of asylum seekers at the end of November was still topped by Syria, Afghanistan and Turkey.
Gregori did not specify how many Russian citizens have applied for asylum this year. The EU earlier announced that it may grant so-called humanitarian visas, not political refugee status, to Russians who are persecuted in their homeland. Statistics on them will be summarized early next year.
The official said the number of asylum seekers has increased this year, but still falls short of the 2015-2016 figures, when more than 1.3 million applicants applied for asylum in the EU, most of whom were fleeing the aftermath of the Syrian civil war.
Most asylum seekers apply in Germany - as of November of this year there were 190,000, up 43 percent from last year. In second place is France. The most undesirable EU country for refugees is Hungary.
Gregori said that the number of asylum seekers will continue to grow for the foreseeable future. Instability and threats to people's security are a feature of the world we live in. Unfortunately, they are not temporary, she said.
