(12 May 2015) – The 27 EU Member States for which data are available granted protection status to 185 000 asylum seekers in 2014, up by almost 50% compared with 2013. Syrians remain the main beneficiaries.
The largest group of beneficiaries of protection status in the EU in 2014 remained citizens of Syria (68 400 persons or 37% of the total number of persons granted protection status), followed at a distance by citizens of Eritrea (14 600 or 8%) and those of Afghanistan (14 100 or 8%). Together, these three citizenships accounted for more than half of all persons granted protection status in the EU in 2014.
In 2014, the highest numbers of persons granted protection status were registered in Germany (47 600, or +82% compared with 2013) and Sweden (33 000, or +25%), followed by France (20 600, or +27%) and Italy (20 600, or +42%).
Out of the 185 000 persons who were granted protection status in 2014, 104 000 persons were granted refugee status (56% of all positive decisions), 61 000 subsidiary protection (33%) and 20 000 authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons (11%).