A total of 569 irregular immigrants, mostly Africans, were landed in Malta last year, a big drop of 71.7 per cent when compared to 2013, according to the National Statistics Office.

Moreover, 991 people were found to be present illegally in Malta, a decrease of about 59 per cent over the previous year. Most of them – about 61 per cent – were Africans. Of these, 173 were returned to their country; the majority were in fact returned to Nigeria.

Meanwhile, due to the lower influx of irregular immigrants, the population of open centres was halved. The busiest open centre is that of Ħal Far, which houses 60.2 per cent of the migrants here while more than a quarter reside in Marsa. The majority of the residents in the centres were males.

In 2014, the Office of the Refugee Commissioner filed 1,352 applications for international protection, a decline of about 40 per cent over the previous year. More than half of the applicants were males aged between 18 and 34 and the majority were Libyans.

A total of 1,735 applications were processed in 2014. Three quarters got a positive decision and the rest were rejected. Two-thirds of the applicants who were granted asylum were of African origin.