Overview
During 2018, over 32,300 refugees were submitted by UNHCR for resettlement to 20 countries in Europe. This is 17% less than in 2017, but approximately double the average rate of 15,400 submissions per year during the previous 10 years. Six countries that received smaller numbers of resettlement submissions in 2017 did not receive any further submissions during 2018.
Between 2008 and 2016, Europe’s proportion of resettlement submissions globally increased from approximately 7% to almost 18%, before substantially increasing to 52% during 2017 and 40% during 2018. The increase in 2017 is primarily due to a significant decrease globally in the scale of some States’ resettlement programmes, most notably by the United States of America. In 2018, resettlement submissions to other countries increased, in particular to Canada.