Nine out of ten people with Eritrean or Syrian nationality who applied for asylum in 2015 were living independently in June 2021. It reports that Central Statistical Office (CBS) Friday. Some of these status holders also applied for Dutch nationality: 41 percent of Syrians and 11 percent of Eritreans who applied for asylum in 2015 had a Dutch passport by the summer of 2021.
In 2015, an exceptionally large number of people fled to the Netherlands, mainly because of the war in Syria. By the summer of 2021, the vast majority of these Syrians (93 percent) and Eritreans (95 percent) were no longer living in a reception location of the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA), but independently in a municipality. This was usually a rental property. About 7 percent of Syrians and 5 percent of Eritreans left the Netherlands in the measured period.
Six years in COA shelter
Of everyone who applied for asylum and had a nationality other than Syrian or Eritrean, more than 42 percent found a home and about half left the Netherlands. Of the asylum applicants who do not come from Syria or Eritrea, 5 percent, almost 850 people, have been in COA reception centers without a residence permit for more than six years.
The number of Syrians and Eritreans living on benefits also decreased over the period under review. In 2016, about half of Syrians and almost two-thirds of Eritreans lived on benefits. In 2021, about one in three Syrians and Eritreans still received benefits.
Syria has been at war since 2011. By 2021, it had claimed nearly 600,000 lives and displaced 6.7 million people. Although Eritrea is not at war, it has been under a dictatorship since the early 1990s, where freedom of expression, the press and religion are at stake. Since 2015, thousands of refugees from these countries still arrive in the Netherlands every year. Among them are many people who travel after their families.