Finnish Immigration Service to clear the asylum queue by the end of this year
By the end of August, the Finnish Immigration Service has made asylum decisions for the about 25,000 asylum seekers who arrived in Finland during 2015 and 2016. About 14,000 asylum seekers are still waiting for a decision at reception centres. Approximately 2,500 of them are children who have applied for asylum alongside their parents. Their applications are often decided on without an asylum interview together with their parents’ applications.
“With the exception of some individual cases, we believe that the asylum seekers who arrived in Finland in 2015 will receive their decisions by the end of the year,” says Esko Repo, Director of the Asylum Unit at the Finnish Immigration Service.
During 2015, a total of 32,476 asylum seekers arrived in Finland. By the end of August this year, about 4,200 asylum seekers have arrived in Finland.
During last year and this year, about 9,000 applicants have received a negative asylum decision and about 6,000 a positive decision. Almost 7,000 applications have expired, that is, the applicant has either not finished the process or it has not been possible to contact him or her for two months. About 3,000 applications have been dismissed because they needed to be processed in another EU country.
Decisions on asylum 1.1.–30.8.2016
total 17 468
Decisions on asylum 2015
total 7 466
Most applicants from Iraq, Syrians as EU relocations, an increase in applicants from Turkey
Most asylum seekers last year came from Iraq and this continues to be the case. Over 21,000 applicants last year and 900 applicants this year came from Iraq. As during previous years, the subsequent largest numbers of asylum seekers came from Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria.
During the last few weeks, the number of asylum seekers from Syria has increased as several asylum seekers have arrived in Finland under the EU relocation scheme. The number of Turkish asylum seekers has also slightly increased in August, possibly because of the political situation in Turkey. In August, 22 asylum seekers arrived from Turkey, when a total of 56 asylum seekers have arrived from Turkey during the whole year.
“We have not yet conducted asylum interviews with the asylum seekers from Turkey but it is entirely possible that among them are persons who have left the country due to recent events,” says Esko Repo.
Queue not cleared by the end of August
The Ministry of the Interior gave the Finnish Immigration Service a target result for 2016 of 100 asylum decisions per man-year as well as the authorisation to hire about 500 new employees to process asylum applications in addition to the existing circa 80 employees working with asylum applications.
At the turn of the year, we believed that with the additional staff we would have made the decisions on all asylum applications from 2015 by the end of August 2016 and on approximately 45,000 applications by the end of the year. This would have meant a decision rate of about 1,000 decisions per week starting from February 2016.
We have at no stage been able to reach the weekly target but have come close to it some weeks. The new staff needed longer than expected to train and learn the job, because you cannot learn to make asylum decision anywhere else in Finland than at the Finnish Immigration Service. Organising supportive measures has also been a challenge: when our operations multiplied, there has been a shortage of both interpreters and facilities for remote interpreting. At present, the rate of decisions is about 700 decisions per week.
More reception centres to be closed
During 2015, the Finnish Immigration Service established in a short time a tenfold number of new reception centres in Finland. The number of reception centres increased from 20 to 200 in a few months.
“The year 2015 will be remembered as the year of the greatest readiness operation of the Finnish Immigration Service in post-war Finland,” says Pekka Nuutinen who in October starts as substitute Director of the Reception Unit at the Finnish Immigration Service.
During 2016, reception centres have been closed and their accommodation capacity has been reduced, as asylum seekers have received their decisions and the applicants have either transferred to municipalities or left the country. Each day at a reception centre costs on average 57 euro per person, which is why we cannot afford to keep places unoccupied.
There is a total of 108 reception centres in Finland at the end of August. In addition, there are 74 units for unaccompanied minor asylum seekers. About 24,000 asylum seekers were registered at reception centres at the end of August.
The number of reception centres and places at them will be further reduced during the autumn. However, the Finnish Immigration Service has a constant readiness to open up more places if the number of asylum seekers increases.
Estimate for 2016 and 2017: 10,000 asylum seekers
The estimate of the Ministry of the Interior for both 2016 and 2017 is still about 10,000 applicants per year.
“The number of future applicants is extremely hard to predict, but the indication nevertheless is that the number of asylum seekers arriving in Finland may permanently have settled at a higher level than before,” says Esko Repo.
Further information for the media:
Esko Repo, Director of Asylum Unit, tel. +358 295 430 431, e-mail: firstname.lastname@migri.fi
Pekka Nuutinen, Director (substitute) of Reception Unit, tel. +358 295 430 431, e-mail: firstname.lastname@migri.fi
