Number of asylum seekers jumps 45 percent

UNITED NATIONS, March 26 (UPI) -- Claims for asylum, prompted by events in Syria and Iraq, increased by 45 percent in 2014, the United Nations refugee agency reported Thursday.

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) report, "Asylum Trends 2014," indicated 866,000 applications for asylum were filed in industrialized countries, up from 596,000 in 2013. Germany had the most with 173,000, followed by the United States, Turkey, Sweden and Italy. The top five countries received 60 percent of the world's claims, and the 150,000 applications from Syria accounted for one-fifth of all claims. The asylum claims in the United States were mostly from Mexico and Central America.

The figures are the highest since 1992, when the Bosnian conflict motivated refugee requests for asylum. "Our response has to be just as generous now as it was then – providing access to asylum, resettlement opportunities and other forms of protection for the people fleeing these terrible conflicts," said UNCHR Commissioner António Guterres. "In the 1990s, the Balkan wars created hundreds of thousands of refugees and asylum-seekers. Many of them found refuge in industrialized countries in Europe, North America and elsewhere. Today, the surge in armed conflicts around the world presents us with similar challenges, in particular the dramatic situation in Syria."

The report also noted the number of Ukrainian citizens seeking asylum increased from 1,400 in 2013 to 15,700 in 2014.