The Department of Immigration in Luxembourg's Ministry for Foreign and European Affairs has confirmed that they have received a total of 197 applications for international protection (asylum) during August.
This number is up substantially from the 131 recorded in July this year, but is comparable to the figure of 190 who applied for asylum during August 2015. To date, the total numer of requests for asylum in Luxembourg has been 1,221, compared to 840 in the first 8 months of 2015 and 632 for the same period in 2014 (in which the total was 1,091).
The majority of the asylum applications have come from people fleeing Syria (39), with 25 from Albania and 15 from Serbia; in total, 76 have come from Europe, 54 from Africa and 66 from Asia, with 1 from the Americas. In the first eight months of the year, there have been the most applications from people fleeing Syria (206), followed by Iraq (149) and Kosovo (125).
In August, 132 decisions were taken by the ministry here concerning applications for asylum, of which 23 were granted refugee status. 25 were refused asylum and 18 were sent back to other countries (7 to Germany) where they had first entered Europe, with just three arriving (from Finland, France, NL). 50 were repatriated, of which 31 went voluntarily and 19 were forcibly removed.
