TIRANA, July 21 – France has expressed its concern over a rising number of Albanian asylum-seekers, asking Albanian authorities to tackle the phenomenon in the next three months.
The alarm was raised this week during a meeting Albania’s Foreign Minister Ditmir Bushati held in Paris with French Minister of Interior Gà©rard Collomb.
A statement by the French ministry of interior says French authorities are concerned over the rising number of Albanian asylum seekers, largely not eligible for the refugee status or international protection because of Albania being an EU candidate and a NATO member country.
Gà©rard Collomb says Albanian asylum-seekers, a considerable number of whom are unaccompanied minors, are occupying a large space in French asylum accommodation units.
The French interior ministry says Albanian authorities have committed to apply reinforced controls in departures for France and combat the migration of unaccompanied minors and document fraud through an action plan that will be implemented in the next three months.
“We are aware of the freedom and commitments that free movement in the Schengen area offers and very determined not to tolerate abusive asylum applications,” Albanian Foreign Minister Ditmir Bushati is quoted as saying in a statement by the Albanian ministry.
According to latest Eurostat data, some 5,440 first-time Albanian applicants sought asylum in EU member countries in the first quarter of 2017, ranking sixth in a top ten list dominated by war-torn Middle East countries.
Albanians ranked the top asylum-seekers in France with 2,960 first-time applications in the first quarter of this year, but were out of the top five citizenships in Germany, the main host of Albanian asylum-seekers in the past couple of years.
France was the second most favourite destination for Albanian asylum seekers in 2016 with about 6,850 applications or a quarter of the Albanian asylum seekers in the EU, ranking Albanians the top country of citizenship for asylum protection in France, according to an earlier report by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.
The number of first time Albanian asylum seekers to EU member countries more than halved in 2016, but Albania remained for the second year in a row among the top 10 countries of citizenship seeking asylum protection in list dominated by war torn Asian and African countries and Russia.
Eurostat data shows the number of Albanian asylum seekers to EU countries dropped to 28,925 in 2016, down from a record 65,935 in 2015 when the country faced a massive exodus.
Germany was once again the main destination of asylum seekers with about 15,000 or half of total first time asylum applicants in EU member countries, down from a record 54,000 in 2015.
However, only two out of 100 Albanians who applied for asylum in EU member countries during the past couple of years have been granted protection under a final decision.
EU member countries, mainly the UK, France and Germany granted asylum status to some 1,780 Albanians in 2015 and 2016 out of a total applications of about 95,000, Eurostat says.
