The number of first-time asylum applicants in the European Union rose 64% last year, the bloc’s statistical agency said Thursday.

Eurostat said that in 2022, 881,200 first-time asylum applicants (non-EU citizens) applied for international protection in EU countries.

The figure does not include the over 4.3 million Ukrainians who were given temporary protection in a number of EU countries due to Russia’s war on Ukraine.

The agency said Syria has continued to be the main country of citizenship of asylum seekers in the EU since 2013. Last year, more than 131,000 Syrians applied for asylum, accounting for 15% of the total number of first-time applications in the EU.

With more than 113,000 applications, Afghans came in second.

Some 25% of all applications, or 217,735, were registered in Germany, followed by France and Spain.

In 2022, in the EU as a whole, there were 1,973 first-time asylum applicants per million people, according to the agency.

Türkiye hosts some 4 million refugees, more than any other country in the world, and is taking new security measures on its borders to humanely prevent an influx of irregular migrants. (Anadolu Agency)

•Syria continues to be main country of citizenship of asylum seekers, says Eurostat