Chapter 5
Table 3 | New asylum claims registered in UNHCR offices with more than 10,000 claims* | 2013-2017
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Turkey
44,800
87,800
133,300
78,600
126,100
Egypt **
10,800
10,000
21,100
28,500
27,800
Malaysia
53,600
25,700
22,100
20,100
23,700
Jordan
6,700
29,100
19,400
12,000
10,600
* Excluding appeal and review claims.
** Includes appeal claims in 2013.
applications, more than three times the number in
2016 (11,900). Most asylum claims were received
from nationals from central and eastern Africa
including Somalis (6,800), Burundians (5,000), and
Eritreans (3,300).
There were 57,000 new individual asylum applications
in Greece during the course of 2017, a 15 per cent
increase from 2016 and more than five times the
number lodged in 2015 (11,400). Syrians submitted the
most applications with 16,300, a decrease from the
26,600 claims registered in 2016. However, asylum
claims submitted by Pakistanis (8,300), Iraqis (7,900),
and Afghans (7,500) all increased considerably
compared with 2016 when 4,400, 4,800 and 4,300
claims were received, respectively.
Canada was the ninth-largest recipient of asylum
claims with 47,800 registered in 2017, more than
double the 23,600 claims registered in 2016. The
largest number was submitted by nationals of Haiti
(7,300) followed by Nigeria (5,500), Turkey (2,200),
and the United States of America (2,100). The
increased number of nationals of the United States
applying for asylum in Canada is mainly composed of
USA-born children of third-country nationals who
were living in the United States, prior to claiming
protection in Canada.
Finally, Tanzania received 36,500 individual asylum
claims in 2017. As with Uganda and Turkey, individual
claims were recorded in addition to substantial group
registration. In the case of Tanzania, there were also
22,500 refugees recognized on a group basis. Two
neighbouring countries of origin accounted for nearly
the entirety of new asylum claims: Burundi with
24,300 claims and the DRC with 12,200.
In certain countries, refugee status determination is
carried out by UNHCR, under its mandate. UNHCR
offices registered a significant proportion of
individual asylum claims in 2017, and countries
receiving the most claims were the same as in 2016.
42
The office in Turkey has continued to receive the
most new requests, with numbers increasing to
levels similar to 2015 after a drop in 2016 [Table 3].
The UNHCR office in Egypt received the next highest
number of new applications with 27,800, followed by
Malaysia (23,700), Jordan (10,600), and Syria (9,900).
By nationality
For the first time since 2013, Syria was not the most
common country of origin for new asylum-seekers
[Figure 15]. The highest number of asylum claims filed
by individuals were from nationals of Afghanistan
who submitted 124,900 claims in 80 different
countries, although this number is considerably
lower than those submitted in 2016 (237,800) and
2015 (271,100). As in 2016, Turkey received the most
claims with 67,400 registered, replacing Germany,
which received 16,400 claims compared with 127,000
in 2016. In contrast to 2016, Greece was the third
most common recipient of claims from Afghans with
7,500, followed by France (6,600) and India (4,500).
Austria and Hungary both saw sharp declines in
claims submitted by Afghan nationals, from 11,500
and 10,800 in 2016 to 3,500 and 1,200 in 2017,
respectively. Pakistan (2,200) and the United
Kingdom (1,900) also continued to receive new
Afghan claims for asylum.
Overall, only about half of substantive asylum
decisions for new applications for Afghan nationals
granted them protection, known as the Total
Protection Rate (TPR), 56 and the protection rates
varied widely between countries. In Germany, the
TPR was under half (47 per cent) for all forms of
56 UNHCR uses two rates to compute the proportion of refugee
claims accepted. The Refugee Recognition Rate is the proportion
of asylum-seekers accorded refugee status out of the total number
of substantive decisions (Convention status, complementary
protection, and rejected cases). The Total Protection Rate is
the proportion of asylum-seekers accorded refugee status or
a complementary form of protection by the total number of
substantive decisions (formerly referred to as Total Recognition
Rate or TRR). Non-substantive decisions are, to the extent
possible, excluded from both calculations. For the purposes of
global comparability, UNHCR uses only these two rates and does
not report rates calculated by national authorities.
unhcr > Global trends 2017
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