There was a 68 per cent rise in the number of applications for international protection in the EU states as well as Norway and Switzerland in the first five months of this year compared to the same period last year, the European Asylum Support Office said.
The office, which today launched its Annual Report on the Situation of Asylum in the European Union 2014, said this followed the 43 per cent increase in the number of applications last year compared to 2013.
Moreover, new trends seemed to be emerging this year. The number of Kosovar applicants was very high until March. Kosovo was the main country of origin of applicants registered in the EU+ between January and May this year, ahead of Syria. This was despite the fact that the volume of Syrian applicants was higher than the level recorded over the same period last year.
There has also been a substantial increase in the numbers of Afghan applicants in recent months.
Since January, a significant rise in the number of applicants claiming to be unaccompanied minors has also been noted in the EU+. They primarily originated from Afghanistan, Eritrea, Syria and Somalia and were mainly received by Sweden, Austria, Germany, and Italy.
The report found that last year there were more than 660,000 applications for international protection in the EU+ - the highest number since the beginning of EU - level data collection in 2008. The highest numbers of asylum applicants recorded were citizens of Syria, the western Balkan countries combined, and Eritrea. The main receiving countries were Germany, Sweden, Italy, France and Hungary.
At the end of 2014, more than 500,000 people were awaiting a decision on their asylum application in the EU+; the volume of pending applications increased by +37 per cent compared to 2013.
The number of applications from citizens of western Balkan countries reached 110,000 with a significant share from Serbia and Kosovo. The ongoing crisis in Syria posed a key challenge in the EU+ in 2014 as the number of applications from Syrians reached more than 128,000.
Afghanistan remained one of the main countries of origin of applicants last year; the 42,745 applications for 2014 represented a 53 per cent increase compared to 2013.
It also had the highest share of unaccompanied minors applying for asylum in the EU+ (6,155).
There were more than 14,000 Ukrainian applicants, which was a 13-fold increase compared to 2013.
The report also looks into key asylum related developments in 2014 such as the Task Force Mediterranean, reception capacity in the member states, developments in national asylum systems and EASO support.
EASO also continued to provide operational support to Greece, Italy, Bulgaria and Cyprus and successfully piloted join - processing projects and a project with Malta and Italy on facilitation of irregular migrants.
EASO trained more than 2,800 asylum and reception officials.
Moreover, EASO held external dimension activities with a number of states including Turkey, Serbia, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia.
It also launched new statistical data collection under its Early warning and Preparedness System, which sees contribution from all EU+ states on a monthly basis, adding to information available from Eurostat.