Nigeria among top world asylum seekers - UNHRC

By Our Correspondent

Nigerians have been ranked high among the people seeking asylum in the world, especially in industrialised nations, Empowered Newswire, a US-based news agency reported on Thursday.

According to the asylum statistics of the world released earlier this week by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, Nigeria is among the nationalities responsible for the rise in asylum levels globally based on UNCHR figures for 2008 released in Geneva.

According to the UNHCR, the leading country with asylum applicants in 2008 was Iraq with 40,500 citizens seeking refuge in industrialised nations of the world.

Iraq was followed by Somalia (21,800), the Russian Federation (20,500), Afghanistan (18,500) and China (17,400).

But Nigeria was listed among the countries recording a significant rise in asylum applications along with Afghanistan, whose rise in asylum seekers rose by 85 per cent, Zimbabwe by 82 per cent and Somalia by 77 per cent.

In the case of Nigeria, asylum seekers from the country in 2008 rose by 71 per cent) and Sri Lanka by 24 per cent). The UN report categorised these nations as having "experienced unrest or conflicts in 2008."

Nigeria also made the top 10 list of people seeking asylum.

For instance, in Italy and Ireland, Nigeria was the number one country of origin of applicants.

In Italy last year alone, there were 5,333 new asylum seekers from Nigeria and 1,008 in Ireland.

Italy was also the country with the highest number of Nigerians seeking asylum last year.

In the same 2008, 970 Nigerians sought asylum in the United Kingdom, 765 in Canada, 801 in Spain, 500 in Germany, 535 in Austria, 746 in Greece, 436 in Norway, 223 in Malta and 988 in Switzerland.

Nigerians also made the top 10 in countries like Slovenia where seven Nigerians sought asylum, Poland, where 19 sought asylum, 27 in Republic of Korea-that is South Korea, eight in Portugal, 56 in Hungary, 18 in Bulgaria, , 76 in Finland and 42 in the Czech Republic.

There were also five Nigerians who sought asylum in the extremely cold country of Iceland.

The report covered 51 industrialised countries which provided monthly data to the UNHCR.

Generally, the number of people seeking asylum in industrialised countries rose in 2008 for the second year in a row, partly due to an increase in applications by people from Afghanistan, Somalia and other countries experiencing turmoil or conflict, including Nigeria, says the report.

Does the figure includes Nigerian asylum seekers living in Nigeria or just those abroad?

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