EU reveals the number of asylum seekers nearly halved in 2017
The number of people seeking international protection in Europe in 2017 dropped by almost half compared to the year before, with most applicants coming from Syria, the European Union's asylum agency said.
The European Asylum Support Office (Easo) said 706,913 people sought asylum in the 28 EU nations plus Norway and Switzerland in 2017, 43% lower than the year before.
It is the second consecutive year that numbers have gone down, after more than one million people entered Europe, mostly Syrian refugees, in 2015.
More than 98,000 Syrians applied for asylum, twice the number coming from anywhere else. More than 40,000 claims were made by nationals from Iraq, Afghanistan and Nigeria.
Easo said around 40% of all asylum applications in 2017 were successful.
