Newly published statistics from Eurostat covering the last three months of 2023 show that there was an increase in both the numbers of persons who were ordered to leave the jurisdiction of the Irish state, and the number of those who were actually physically removed or chose themselves to return to their country of origin.
There was a marked increase in the total numbers for the year with 1,060 orders made in 2023 compared to 600 for the whole of 2022; with 285 of the orders in 2023 leading to an actual return compared to 190 in 2022.
The increases ought be placed in the context of much greater numbers coming to Ireland, but do perhaps indicate that the state is more proactive even if the overall percentages remain small, especially when under 27% of orders in 2023 resulted in an actual return of the person who was the subject of the order.
The Irish statistics have to be placed in the context of the overall situation within the EU and Europe as a whole which continues to be under enormous pressures from migration facilitated by the asylum process and the level of illegal immigration. In contrast to Ireland, the number of orders to leave across the EU fell between the last quarter of 2022 and the last quarter of 2023.
The actual numbers involved indicate the scale of the crisis. There were 105,585 orders made across the 26 member states and 28,000 resulted in the orders being executed or the person otherwise leaving the jurisdiction. The % of those who left across the EU as a whole was very close to the number in Ireland, at 26.5%.
Of the 28,000 persons who did leave the jurisdiction of the EU states, 77% returned to a country outside of the EU.
The leading destination was Morocco which accounted for 8% of persons returned, while Algeria accounted for 7%.
The number of Algerians arriving claiming asylum has been the focus of some debate, and the numbers arriving here from Algeria to claim International Protection fell sharply in the first months of 2024.
According to the EU statistics contained in the table above, there were a total of 245 orders issued to third country nationals to leave the state in the last three months of 2023. The total number for the year was 1,060.
A breakdown of the statistics for countries which have featured in the main countries of origin of persons claiming asylum here, and currently housed in IPAS accommodation, show that these accounts for most of the number of orders to leave. These account for 835 of the orders issued over the whole of 2023.
The highest number was 280 issued to persons claiming to be of Georgian citizenship, followed by 180 persons from Albania and 135 from Brazil. Georgia and Albania can be viewed in the context of a crackdown on bogus applicants from those states, but the high number of Brazilians who were ordered to leave is possibly connected to issues other than the asylum application process. We do not have a breakdown for the different reasons why persons might have been issued with an order.
A total of 835 orders were issued to persons from the three countries referred to along with persons ordered to be returned to Algeria, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Nigeria, India and Pakistan. Of the total number of orders issued, just 195 or 23% resulted in the person issued with the order actually leaving the state.