Why is Europe pausing Syrian asylum claims after al-Assad’s fall?

“Wir schaffen das!” or “We can do it!” said former German Chancellor Angela Merkel nine years ago, when she proclaimed that Germany and Europe had the capacity to grant asylum to people seeking refuge.

Back then, her words offered hope to hundreds of thousands of Syrian people who were fleeing the country’s now-13-year-long civil war, in search of refuge in Europe.

But today, Merkel’s open-door policy for asylum seekers, especially for people from Syria, has changed in Europe.

Just days after the fall of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, countries across the continent – including Germany, Austria, Belgium, Greece, Italy, Sweden, Denmark and the United Kingdom – have all announced plans to pause asylum applications for Syrian people seeking asylum. This includes both new applications and those that are still being processed.

On Monday, Filippo Grandi, the head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), called for “patience and vigilance”. In a statement, he said the agency is “hoping that developments on the ground will evolve in a positive manner, allowing voluntary, safe and sustainable returns to finally occur – with refugees able to make informed decisions.”

How many Syrians have claimed asylum in Europe?

Since the onset of the Syrian civil war in 2011, the United Nations reports, at least 7.4 million Syrians remain internally displaced, with approximately 4.9 million seeking refuge in neighbouring countries. An additional 1.3 million have resettled elsewhere, mostly in Europe.

According to a midyear review released by the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) in September, of a total 513,000 asylum applications received by EU countries in 2024, “Syrians continued to lodge by far the most applications in the first half of the year”. Their asylum claims represent 14 percent of the total number of applications – a rise of seven percentage points compared to the same period in 2023.

The EUAA report also highlighted that around 101,000 Syrian asylum applications are still pending in EU countries.

Meanwhile in the UK, according to the country’s Home Office, more than 27,000 people from Syria have claimed asylum since the onset of the civil war, with 90 percent of claims being approved. However, 6,502 Syrian asylum claims are still pending as of September 2024.

Following the fall of al-Assad, some EU countries have announced a “pause” in the processing of asylum applications while they get to grips with the situation inside Syria, they say.

The 27-member bloc’s foreign leaders will meet later this month to discuss a joint response.

In the UK, which left the EU following the 2016 Brexit referendum, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper noted that the situation in Syria is moving very fast. “And that is why, like Germany, like France, and like other countries, we have paused asylum decisions on cases from Syria while the Home Office reviews and monitors the current situation,” she said.

Bram Frouws, director of Geneva-based think tank Mixed Migration Centre, told Al Jazeera that pausing asylum claims “basically means Syrians who are still in an asylum process and awaiting a decision will be in limbo for much longer”.

“Knowing there are long asylum backlogs in many [European] countries, this adds to the uncertainty for many. It also means that those who arrive from now on, while still possible to file an asylum claim, will have to wait long for a decision,” he added.

For now, there is no change in status for those who have already been granted asylum in European countries.