Relevant data with regards to applications:
- In 2024, 39,615 persons filed an application for international protection at the Immigration Office (IO). This includes 484 persons who arrived in Belgium as part of resettlement.
- 6,469 persons filed a subsequent application for international protection, 9% more than 2023.
- 2,594 applications were from alleged unaccompanied foreign minors (UAM). 86.1 % of the applicants who declared to be unaccompanied foreign minors are boys and 13.9 % are girls. 21.9% of them are from Eritrea, 18 % from Syria and 16.9 % from Afghanistan.
- the total number of applicants is 11.6 % higher than in 2023.
- the main countries of origin of applicants for international protection were Palestine, Syria, Afghanistan, Eritrea and Turkey.
With respect to decisions:
- In 2024, decisions taken represented a 14 % increase compared to 2023.
- The recognition rate was 47.2% (which represents a slight increase from previous year, 43.5 % in 2023).
- 45.3 % of these decisions were decisions granting refugee status and 1.9% were decisions granting subsidiary protection status. The highest number of recognised refugee statuses in 2024 were granted to Palestinians (3,281), Syrians (2,774), Eritreans (2,155) and Afghans (1,944). The highest number of subsidiary protection statuses were granted to Yemenis (232), Syrians (169) and Sudanese (58) in 2024.
- The number of inadmissibility decisions remains high amounting to 14.4% of all decisions.
- At the end of 2024, the caseload at the CGRS amounted to 26,619 cases (32,007 persons).
The CGRS continues to focus on special actions to increase efficiency while maintaining the quality of the decisions and taking into account the well-being of its staff. Some of the measures taken or further developed over the past year include:
- Recruiting new protection officers.
- Shortening personal interviews if possible.
- Further intensification of cooperation with the Immigration Office.
- Enhanced screening of cases to support and facilitate processing.
- The development of a Fast Track Procedure to speed up a final decision for certain applications that have little chance of receiving protection status. This procedure covers safe countries of origin (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Northern Macedonia, Kosovo, Montenegro, Serbia and India) as well as Georgia, Moldova and the Democratic Republic of Congo. In 2024, the average processing time for the safe countries of origin was 14 working days. For the other countries (Congo, Georgia and Moldova), the average processing time was 43 working days.
- Preparatory phase launched to roll out cross-cutting measures to support case processing and to run new units on a voluntary basis according to an updated organisational model (different work organisation and division of tasks within the team).
- Recruiting 58 protection officers to be integrated into a separate cell.
To consult these and further data in detail please click here