Brussels, 18/06/2010 (Agence Europe) - EU member states granted protection to 78,800 asylum seekers in 2009, compared to 75,100 in 2008. The largest groups of beneficiaries of protection status in the EU27 were citizens of Somalia (13,400 persons or 17% of the total number of persons granted protection status), Iraq (13,100 or 17%) and Afghanistan (7,100 or 9%). In 2009, 317,500 decisions on asylum applications were made in the EU27, of which 228,600 were first instance decisions and 88,900 final decisions on appeal. Decisions made at the first instance resulted in 61,700 persons being granted protection status, while a further 17,100 received protection status on appeal. The rate of recognition of asylum applicants, i.e. the share of positive decisions in the total number of decisions, was 27% for first instance decisions and 19% for final decisions on appeal. Of the 78,800 persons who were granted protection status, 39,300 persons were granted refugee status, 29,900 subsidiary protection and 9,600 authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons. More than three quarters of grants of protection status in the EU27 were made in the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Sweden, Italy and the Netherlands. In 2009, the highest number of persons granted protection status was registered in the United Kingdom (12,500), followed by Germany (12,100), France (10,400), Sweden (9,100), Italy (8,600) and the Netherlands (8,100). These member states accounted for more than three quarters of all those granted protection status in the EU27. The rate of recognition varies considerably among member states, which is partly due to the differing citizenships of applicants in each member state. The highest rates of recognition in the first instance were recorded in Malta (66%), Slovakia (56%), Portugal (51%), the Netherlands and Denmark (both 48%), and the lowest in Greece (1%), Ireland (4%), Spain (8%), France (14%) and Slovenia (15%).
Somalis were the single largest group of persons granted protection status in the EU27. Eurostat has also published a report on the characteristics of asylum seekers. It should be noted that the processing of requests takes time and that there is not, over one and the same year, any direct link between requests submitted and decisions taken. A total of more than 260,000 asylum applicants were recorded in 2009. Among other characteristics such as origin and gender, the report highlights that 60,500 asylum seekers were minors, and that 12,200 of these minors were unaccompanied. (B.C./transl.jl)