Eurostst: Numbers of Asylum-Seekers from Ukraine Fell in 2018

Last year, 8,500 Ukrainians sought asylum in the EU. The number is lower in comparison with the previous years. This is the information released by Eurostat on March 14. 

Thus, in 2018, 8,490 sought asylum in the EU countries. For comparison: 8,945 persons sought asylum in the EU in 2017, more than 11,000 persons – in 2016, nearly 21,000 persons – in 2015, and 13,500 persons – in 2014. 

There are countries where the number of asylum-seekers from Ukraine is relatively high, but it is still much lower than the number of asylum-seekers from the other countries. 

In particular, 2,485 sought asylum in Italy last year. It is followed by Spain (1,880 persons), Germany (1,060 persons) and France (725 persons). 

In Poland, the authorities of which stated about “hundreds of thousands” of refugees from Ukraine, Russians remain the leaders by asylum application numbers (1,600 applications), which is 67 percent from the total number of submitted applications. 

High share of asylum application submitted by Ukrainians is observed in the Czech Republic, where citizens of Ukraine sought asylum more frequently than any other asylum-seekers (280 persons or 21 percent from the total number of submitted applications), in Portugal (135 persons, or 11 percent), Estonia (15 Ukrainians, or 17 percent), and Poland (225 applications, or 9 percent).