Italian authorities registered more than 77,000 asylum applications last year, far fewer than in other countries such as Germany, Spain, and France.
These conclusions were reached by the annual report of the Italian Council for Refugees (CIR) for the past year, which said that a total of 173,598 refugees arrived in Italy due to the war in Ukraine.
“2022 was a particularly difficult year for asylum applications in Italy and Europe: the war in Ukraine has resulted in almost 8 million refugees, and it has forced 173,589 people to seek asylum in Italy (Ministry of the Interior figures as of 31 December 2022)”, – the report says.
The report also noted that such a scenario requires continued commitment and action to protect and integrate refugees.
The Italian Refugee Council’s annual report for last year indicated that asylum applications in Italy accounted for more than a third of those registered in Germany in 2022, during which the country accepted 217,735 applications for international protection.
Authorities in France (137,505) and Spain (116,140) also registered more asylum applications in 2022, as the total number of asylum applications was just over one-third that of Germany, France, and Spain, or 35 percent 56 percent, and 66 percent.
“About the Italian asylum system, 52,625 applications were processed: 53 percent were rejected (27,385), 12 percent (6,161) were granted refugee status, 13 percent were granted subsidiary protection (6,770) and 21 percent were granted special protection (10,865),” the report says.
The report notes that the figure is down from 2021 figures by a total of nine percent.
Commenting on the data, CIR President Roberto Zaccaria said that no crisis is unmanageable, but European commitment is needed.
As for those who arrived by boat on the Italian coast, there were 105,140, based on data provided by Italy’s Interior Ministry, while data provided by IOM showed that 1,417 of them died or were missing in the Central Mediterranean.
President Zaccaria also noted that the above figures tell a different story compared to what is perceived, given that managing the migration flow that reaches the Italian coast is indeed difficult.