A number greater than Malta’s population – 435,760 people – applied for international protection in the EU last year, the highest volume of applications since the data started being collected in 2008.
The number of Syrian applicants increased in nearly all EU member states in 2013 and the beginning of 2014, according to the annual report released by the European Asylum Support Office.
Since March 2014 there has also been a significant rise in the numbers of Ukrainian citizens applying for asylum.
Malta, however, does not follow this trend. Of the 2,205 new asylum applicants – an increase of seven per cent on last year – 46 per cent were from Somalia.
The report on the asylum situation in the EU highlights the fact that, by the end of 2013, more than 352,000 people were awaiting a decision on their asylum application, 33 per cent more than in the previous year. Malta was responsible for 905 of those pending cases, an increase of 21 per cent over the previous year.
The highest number of pending cases in Malta (41 per cent) came from Somalis. On the other hand 90 Somalis withdrew their application, about 50 per cent more than last year.
In 2013, asylum seekers in Malta were relocated to Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and the United States. Bulgaria and Hungary also offered to take asylum seekers from Malta but no candidates were interested in relocating to these two countries. The report also notes that the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has taken a strong stand on the practice of detention in Malta, quoting the commissioner saying that “detaining all asylum seekers who arrive to the territory in an irregular manner is unlawful, as this is not specifically authorised by Maltese law, European law or international refugee law”.
It also refers to a ruling in the case Suso Musa v Malta, in which the European Court for Human Rights recommended that Malta take the necessary steps to improve asylum seekers’ conditions and shorten their period of detention.
It also mentions the UNHCR’s concerns regarding LGBTI asylum seekers and beneficiaries of protection who are not in a position to reside in the open reception centres because of harassment but cannot afford private accommodation.
According to the report, in the first five months of 2014 there was an overall 19 per cent rise in the number of applications for asylum in the EU compared to the same period last year.
The highest numbers of asylum applicants were citizens of Syria, Russian Federation and the Western Balkan countries including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbia.
The number of Ukrainian refugees is expected to grow over 2014. In the last 20 years the average number of applications from Ukraine was roughly a hundred each month but from March to May, over 2,000 applications were submitted.