A total of 213,200 first time asylum seekers applied for protection in the European Union between April and June, 15 per cent more than in the previous three months and 85 per cent more than the same period last year.

The number of Syrians and Afghans particularly rose considerably to reach almost 44,000 and 27,000, respectively.

Kosovars, who were the top citizenship of first time asylum applicants in the first three months this years, have seen their number drop from almost 50,000 during the first quarter 2015 to just over 10,000 in the second quarter 2015.

The highest number of first time applicants was registered in Germany with
80,900 first time applicants (38 per cent of total first time applicants in the EU), followed by Hungary (32,700, or 15 per cent), Austria (17,400, or eight per cent), Italy (14,900, or seven per cent), France (14,700, or seven per cent) and Sweden (14,300, or seven per cent).

Compared with the previous quarter, the number of first time asylum applicants in the second quarter notably jumped in the Netherlands (+159 per cent), Latvia (+123 per cent), Austria (+79 per cent), Finland (+67 per cent) and Denmark (+66 per cent).

Compared with the population of each member sate, the highest rates of registered first time applicants during the period were recorded in Hungary (3,317 first time applicants per million inhabitants), ahead of Austria (2,026), Sweden (1,467) and Germany (997).

In contrast, the lowest rates were observed in Slovakia (five applicants per million inhabitants), Croatia (six), Romania (19), Slovenia (20), Lithuania (21), Portugal (24) and the Czech Republic (26).

There were 380 first time asylum applicants in Malta, 35 more than in the previous three month. This was 0.2 per cent of total first time applications in the EU.

In the second quarter 2015, there were 420 first time asylum applicants per million inhabitants in the EU.