Dutch authorities to send "unfounded" asylum seekers back home countries
Xinhua, March 14, 2016 Adjust font size:
About a quarter of the first-time asylum applications submitted in the Netherlands during the first nine weeks of 2016 have been "unfounded" because the applicants came from safe countries and regions, the Dutch Immigration and Naturalization Service (IND) announced Monday.
These asylum seekers are likely to be sent back to their home countries as they need no protection, according to the Dutch authorities responsible for assessing asylum applications.
About 6,300 asylum applications were submitted in the Netherlands in the first nine weeks of this year. Around 4,400 were first-time asylum seekers, among which some 900 came from Albania, Serbia and Kosovo. The areas, as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and others, are considered safe by the Dutch government.
The IND has given priority to asylum applications submitted by people from safe areas since March 1. It aims at accelerating the procedures for rejecting these applications, making room for asylum seekers from unsafe regions.
Asylum seekers who have registered previously in another European country before signing in in the Netherlands may be sent back to the first European country they reached, said the IND.
In the first nine weeks this year, about 1,000 asylum applications came from the Syrians.
In 2015, a total of 58,880 people asked for asylum in the Netherlands, almost doubled the number of 2014. A massive 27,700 came from Syria. Endit