Malta received 4,276 first-time applications for asylum seeker status in 2018, the third highest number of registered asylum seeker applications relative to its population in the European Union, according to statistics published by Eurostat.

The country that received the highest number of such applications was Cyprus with 8,805 first-time applicants per million inhabitants, followed by Greece (6,051), Malta (4,276), and Luxembourg (3,694).

The countries with the lowest numbers of such applications were Slovakia (28), Poland (63), Hungary (65), Estonia (68), and Latvia (91).

In 2017 there was a total number of 654,600 applicants, an 11% decrease when compared to the 580,800 seen in 2018. This was also less than half of the number recorded in the peak year 2015 when 1,256,600 first-time asylum applicants were registered.

The number of asylum applicants in 2018 is comparable to the level recorded in 2014, before the peaks of 2015 and 2016.

Almost 30% of all first-time applicants seeking international protection in the EU Members States continue to be citizens of Syria (80,900), Afghanistan (41,000), and Iraq (39,600).

Syrian was also the main citizenship of asylum seekers in the EU Member States in 2018, standing at 14% of first-time applicants, and has held this position each year since 2013. 50% of them were registered in Germany (44,200), and they were the main citizenship of asylum seekers in eight EU Member States.

With 41 000 first-time applicants (or 7% of the EU total) in 2018, Afghan was the second main citizenship of asylum seekers in the EU Member States. Almost 29% of Afghans applied in Greece (11 800). Afghan was the main citizenship of asylum seekers in five EU Member States.

Iraqi (7% of the total number of first-time applicants) was the third main citizenship of asylum seekers in the EU Member States in 2018. Of the 39 600 Iraqis seeking asylum protection for the first-time in the EU in 2018, more than 41% applied in Germany (16 300). Iraqi was the main citizenship of asylum seekers in two EU Member States.

At the end of 2018, 878 600 applications for international protection in the EU Member States were still under consideration by the national authorities (excluding Finland, as data not available). At the end of 2017, this figure was slightly higher (927 000). Germany had the largest share of applications pending in the EU at the end of 2018 (384 800, or 44% of the EU total), ahead of Italy (103 000, or 12%), Spain (78 700, or 9%) and Greece (76 300, or 9%).