Asylum applications in a descent: Afghans lead the statistics!

Asylum applications in a descent: Afghans lead the statistics!

Österreich - The refugee situation in Austria shows a dramatic decline in asylum applications in February 2025. A total of 1,397 applications were made, which corresponds to a decline of 37 percent compared to the same month in the previous year. The main reason for this decline is the Syrian applicants, of whom only 315 submitted an application in February. This is just over half of the 618 applications from January. Compared to the previous year, there were 1,308 Syrian applications in February. The current figures reflect a worrying development, because since 2020 there have never been so few applications from Syrian refugees in Austria, as 5min.at reported.

asylum applications and their distribution

A look at the overall situation shows that Afghanistan remains at the head of the application statistics. In February 2025, 568 Asylum applications were made by Afghans, of which 120 are new. The remaining applications are follow -up applications or come from children born in Austria. In view of a recent decision by the ECJ, it can now be observed that Afghan women often apply asylum applications, although they are often only granted subsidiary protection. In the first two months of this year there were a total of 3,315 asylum applications, while it was 4,489 in the previous year. It is particularly alarming that almost 52 percent of applicants are under 18 years old. In addition, the number of entry for the purpose of family reunification from almost 1,000 in the previous year has dropped to only 60 in February, which is also due to the preliminary suspension of the processing of Syrian asylum applications, such as krone.at

Overall, the asylum statistics show that Austria is in a European comparison in ninth place, while the number of applicants in the EU has decreased by 19 percent. In addition, the situation in basic care is slightly relaxed, since over 66,000 people are currently being looked after, which is around 1,500 less than at the beginning of the year. Among these are Ukrainians who make up about 55 percent.