Italy 2nd to Germany in EU for asylum requests in 2017

(ANSA) - Brussels, March 20 - Italy was second-top in the European Union for the number of first-time asylum applicants registered in 2017 behind Germany, Eurostat said on Tuesday. Italy had 126,550 requests last year, 19. 5% of the total.
    That was a rise of 4% on the 121,185 registered in 2016.
    Last year the top country of origin of asylum seekers in Italy was Nigeria with 24,950 applications.
    With 198,300 first-time applicants in 2017, Germany accounted for 31% of the total in 2017, although the figure was down by 73% on the previous year. Last year 650,000 first-time asylum seekers applied for international protection in the EU, down on 46% on the 1.2065 million of 2016. In the table for last year, Italy was followed by France (91,100 applications), Greece (57,000), the United Kingdom (33,300) and Spain (30,400).