"The number of Hong Kong people applying for asylum in the UK and Australia has dropped significantly. Australia has only approved five applications in the past five years"

"The number of Hong Kong people applying for asylum in the UK and Australia has dropped significantly. Australia has only approved five applications in the past five years."

2024-08-14

[Text/Yang Rong, Observer Network] After the implementation of the Hong Kong National Security Law in 2020, some Hong Kong rioters fled for fear of crime, and some thugs who knew they might violate the law also sought various ways to apply for "asylum" and emigrate to foreign countries.

However, official data recently disclosed by the Hong Kong "South China Morning Post" on August 14 showed that the approval rate of Australia and the United Kingdom for Hong Kong people's so-called asylum applications was very low, and the number of related applications has also begun to decline since the middle of last year, falling to the level before the "Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill Movement" in 2019.

According to the latest data from the Australian Department of Home Affairs, Australia received 584 protection visa applications from Hong Kong residents from 2019 to April 2024, but only five applications were approved during the same period. From 2019 to the first quarter of 2024, the UK Home Office received 332 asylum applications from Hong Kong residents, and about 75 applications were approved during the same period. Some applications from both countries came from minors (66 from Australia and 18 from the UK).

Hong Kong groups in Australia said that all approved applications were submitted before 2019, and that no Hong Kong asylum seekers have been interviewed by the Immigration Department, let alone obtained any protection visa.

The report also noted that in terms of the number of applications per month, the month with the most applications for Australian protection visas submitted by Hong Kong residents was July 2020, one month after the implementation of the Hong Kong National Security Law, with 34 applications that month. The peak number of asylum applications received by the UK from Hong Kong residents occurred in the third quarter of 2020. However, the number of applications from asylum seekers in these two countries has dropped sharply since the middle of last year.

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"The number of Hong Kong people applying for asylum in the UK and Australia has dropped significantly. Australia has only approved five applications in the past five years."

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