Brussels, 18/09/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 18 September, the European Union's official statistics office, Eurostat, indicated that there were over 210,000 first-time asylum seekers in the EU in the second quarter of 2015 (April to June) up by 15% compared with the first quarter of 2015 and by 85% compared with the second quarter of 2014.
According to a Eurostat press release, the third of these new asylum seekers come from Syria or Afghanistan. “ In particular, the number of Syrians and Afghans rose considerably to reach almost 44,000 and 27,000 respectively. They represent the two main citizenships of first-time asylum applicants in the EU over the second quarter 2015, accounting for a third of all first-time applicants”.
Kosovars, who were the top citizenship of first-time asylum applicants in the first three months of 2015, have seen their number drop from almost 50,000 during the first quarter 2015 to just over 10,000 in the second quarter 2015. More than 1 out of 3 applied for asylum in Germany. During the second quarter 2015, the highest number of first-time applicants was registered in Germany (80,900 first-time applicants, or 38% of total first-time applicants in the EU), followed by Hungary (32,700, or 15%), Austria (17,400, or 8%), Italy (14,900, or 7%), France (14,700, or 7%) and Sweden (14,300, or 7%).
Compared with the previous quarter, the number of first-time asylum applicants in the second quarter 2015 notably jumped in the Netherlands (+159%), Latvia (+123%), Austria (+79%), Finland (+67%) and Denmark (+66%).
Compared with the population of each member state, the highest rates of registered first-time applicants during the second quarter 2015 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 (5 applicants per million inhabitants), Croatia (6), Romania (19), Slovenia (20), Lithuania (21), Portugal (24) and the Czech Republic (26). In the second quarter 2015, there were 420 first-time asylum applicants per million inhabitants in the EU.
Eurostat illustrates how the majority of Syrians who applied for the first time for asylum in the EU did so in the second quarter 2015 in Germany (16,300 out of 44,000 Syrian requests), Hungary (8,400), Austria (5,300) and Sweden (3,900). Eurostat adds that in total, Syrians made up the main nationality of asylum seekers in 10 member states. Afghanistan (27,000 first-time asylum applicants, or 13% of the total number of first-time applicants in the EU) represented the second main country of citizenship of asylum seekers in the EU. The majority of them seeking asylum protection for the first time in the EU applied in Hungary. With 7,700 first-time applicants during the second quarter 2015, Albania completed the top 3 citizenships of asylum seekers in the EU.
The question of redistributing asylum seekers between EU countries will be tackled once again on Tuesday 22 September by European home secretaries, who will also be looking at the emergency relocation mechanism again. On Friday 18 September, the German Foreign Minister, Franz-Walter Steinmeier, threatened the countries that were deemed as not sufficiently cooperating (Slovakia and the Czech Republic, for the main part) with a qualified majority vote. According to AFP, the German foreign minister indicated that “if it is not possible any other way, then we will have to look at the possibility of going to a qualified majority vote” for these two countries. The European Commission is hoping to obtain a decision involving all member states.
This meeting will precede the Special Summit arranged for Wednesday 23 September. Officially, this summit is not supposed to be looking at the question of relocating the 120,000 asylum seekers as requested by the Commission, but rather, focus on an agenda mix of foreign affairs and the budget, explained one source on Friday. It could possibly discuss the causes of the migrant crisis by assessing the situation in Syria and Libya or the issue of cooperation with Turkey. The budget part of the meeting will involve finding new resources for the European agencies such as Frontex, which are in charge of the EU's external borders. (Solenn Paulic)