Albanian asylum seekers in the UK and EU

By Peter William Walsh & Pragya Upreti

This briefing note, first published on 4 November 2022, has been updated to reflect recent policy developments and the release of data covering 2024.

In summer 2022, Albanian crossings of the English Channel surged, with many arrivals claiming asylum. On 13 December that year, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak highlighted Albania in a statement on “illegal migration,” announcing an agreement with the Albanian government to accelerate the return of its citizens. By 2024, crossings had fallen to pre-2019 levels. This briefing examines how Albanian unauthorised and asylum migration to the UK has changed since the 2022 spike, compares these trends with those in the EU, and presents key statistics in response to media and civil society requests.

Key points

• Albanian citizens accounted for 17% of UK asylum applicants in 2022, but just 3% in 2024.
• Albanian small boat arrivals fell sharply after 2022.
• Between 2018 and 2024, around 3,800 Albanian small boat arrivals were removed from the UK, making up around three-quarters of all small boat returns.
• The government credits the post-2022 fall in Albanian small boat arrivals to a returns deal, though numbers had already fallen dramatically before the deal was announced.
• Only 3% of UK initial decisions on Albanian asylum applications were positive in 2024 – much lower than in 2022.
• Grants of protection to women drove the UK’s high asylum grant rate for Albanian applicants in 2022.
• Around one in four Albanian citizens arriving via small boat in 2022 were referred to the UK’s modern slavery system.

How many Albanian citizens claim asylum in the UK?

The number of Albanian nationals claiming asylum in the UK rose and then fell sharply from 2021 to 2024. In 2022, it peaked at over 17,000 individuals (including dependants), or 17% of all asylum applicants. This marked a significant departure from previous years, in which Albanian applications represented a much smaller share of total claims. For example, Albanians made up 9% of people claiming asylum in 2021.

By 2024, the number of Albanian asylum claimants had fallen to under 3,000, accounting for just 3% of all claims (Figure 1, left chart).

Figure 1

While asylum applications from all nationalities have increased in recent years (Figure 1, right-hand chart), the 2022 surge in Albanian applications was disproportionate relative to trends among other nationalities.

In 2022, the UK received many more Albanian asylum seekers than any other European country (Figure 2). As of 2024, the UK remained the leader, although the gap between the UK and EU+ countries had narrowed considerably.

Figure 2

Fluctuations in the main countries of origin of asylum seekers are not unusual. For example, Zimbabwean nationals accounted for one-third of all asylum grants in 2009, but just 3% in 2012.

There is limited available evidence explaining the rise in Albanian asylum claims from mid-2022. Migration flows are inherently difficult to forecast and even to explain after the fact, particularly in the asylum context, where numbers are shaped by a range of interrelated factors, including geopolitical developments, migrant networks, and the availability of information. Academic research has typically suggested that policy is not the major cause of changes in the number of people claiming asylum in destination countries (see The Migration Observatory’s commentary, UK policies to deter people from claiming asylum).

In a 2022 evidence briefing to the Home Affairs committee of the UK Parliament, the government’s Clandestine Channel Threat Commander, Dan O’Mahoney, cited the activities of organised smuggling networks as a likely driver behind the increase, noting that smugglers had made small boat crossings more accessible for Albanian nationals.

Another potential reason the UK received more Albanian asylum seekers than comparable countries in 2022 is that in the UK, Albanians without immigration status are more likely to be detected and thereafter claim asylum to prevent or delay removal. By contrast, Albanian nationals can travel visa-free to the Schengen Zone for up to 90 days, with fewer barriers and less risk of enforcement action if they overstay. The situation facing small boat arrivals in the UK is different, with almost all being detected. As O’Mahoney stated in the same oral evidence session: “pretty much 100%” of small boat arrivals to the UK are detected.

How many Albanian citizens have arrived by small boat?

In 2022, around 12,700 Albanian nationals were detected arriving in the UK by small boat. This figure represented 27% of all small boat arrivals that year, making Albanians the most common nationality among those detected.

In 2024, the number of Albanians detected crossing the Channel by small boat was much smaller. And during the first quarter of 2025 (from 1 January to 31 March), only 25 Albanian nationals were detected arriving by this route (Figure 3, left chart).

Of the 12,658 Albanians detected in 2022, 95% arrived in the six months from May to October inclusive. Fewer Albanians arrived via small boat in the last quarter of 2022 and the first quarter of 2023 (Figure 3, left chart). By contrast, the number of citizens of other countries arriving via small boat increased in Q4 2022 (Figure 3, right-hand chart).

Figure 3

Of the roughly 12,700 Albanians who arrived by small boat in 2022, 86% claimed asylum (Home Office, Table Irr_D02), and of the 616 Albanian small boat arrivals recorded in 2024, 578 claimed asylum (94%).

How many Albanian small boat arrivals have been removed from the UK?

Relatively few people who reached the UK by crossing the Channel in a small boat have been returned to another country – a total of around 5,000 between 2018 and 2024, or around 3% of all arrivals.

The figure is higher for Albanians. Of the 15,100 Albanian small boat arrivals from 2018 to 2024 inclusive, around 3,800 were returned, or 25%.

Indeed, most returns of small boat arrivals have been to Albania – 76% of the total (Figure 4). The government prioritised the processing of Albanian asylum applications after arrivals spiked in 2022, and overall returns to the country increased sharply following the signing of a returns agreement the same year.

Figure 4

Why did Albanian small boat arrivals spike in 2022, and fall sharply after?

On 13 December 2022, the UK and Albanian governments signed a Joint Communique to fast-track the removal of Albanian nationals arriving without authorisation. The ability to remove Albanian citizens was not new, however: Albania had long been one of the countries that accepted substantial numbers of removals and deportations from the UK.

The Home Office released a statement in May 2024 detailing the “success of our partnership [with Albania] to tackle people smugglers and illegal migration”. It reported that under the UK-Albania returns agreement, nearly 6,000 Albanian nationals had been removed in the previous year. Not all of these were Albanians who arrived by small boat. Removal figures also include foreign national offenders, who are non-British citizens who have been convicted either in the UK of any criminal offence or abroad of any serious criminal offence.

It is difficult to attribute the fall in Albanian small boat arrivals predominantly to the UK-Albania returns deal. Although the deal could be a major driver of continuing low numbers of Albanian small boat arrivals, available data suggest that such arrivals had already fallen sharply prior to the December 2022 announcement of the agreement. While around 9,000 Albanians arrived by small boat in Q3 2022 (1 July to 30 September), this had fallen to around 1,000 in October, 166 in November, and 28 in December 2022.

What is the success rate of Albanian asylum claims in the UK?

In an August 2022 UK government press release, published in response to the spike in Albanian small boat arrivals in the summer, the UK government described Albania as a “safe and prosperous country,” framing most Albanian asylum claims as primarily economic in nature and therefore “spurious.”

In 2021 and 2022, almost half of the UK’s initial decisions on Albanian asylum applications were positive. However, this fell to just 3% in 2024 (Figure 5). Of the 97% that were refused, some will go on to appeal successfully against their initial decision and may ultimately be granted asylum or another form of permission to stay in the UK.

Figure 5

The increase in the asylum grant rate for Albanian citizens from 2019 to 2022 took place as grant rates have risen across the UK asylum system as a whole, from 33% in 2018 to 76% in 2022. Possible explanations include changes in guidance, providing more detailed information about risks facing particular groups, and operational decisions to prioritise more straightforward cases with higher grant rates, during a period when the asylum backlog was growing.

In 2022, the UK had one of the highest grant rates for Albanian asylum seekers among European countries. Only Italy had a higher initial decision grant rate that year, at 65%. By comparison, 28 of the 31 EU+ countries—comprising the EU-27, Switzerland, and the three European Economic Area countries (Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway)—did not grant protection to any Albanian adult asylum applicants.

UK grant rates for Albanian asylum seekers in 2024 were comparable with most EU countries, but lower than France, Ireland, and Italy (Figure 6).

The fall in the success rate of Albanian asylum claims has occurred amid a broader decrease in the initial decision grant rate in the UK (for all nationalities), from 76% in 2022 to 47% in 2024. The decline in overall asylum grant rates may be linked to policy changes introduced by the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, which raised the standard of proof required for asylum to be granted. Previously, applicants had to demonstrate that there was a “reasonable degree of likelihood” that they would be persecuted on return to their country of origin. The Nationality and Borders Act raised this threshold so that claimants now have to demonstrate that, “on the balance of probabilities”, they would face persecution.

Figure 6

It is difficult to determine why grant rates vary so significantly by country. Countries’ particular policies regarding Albanian asylum seekers are likely to be one important factor. Such policies can change frequently, with the UK recently updating its internal guidance on how its asylum decision-makers should deal with Albanian asylum applications. But policy is not the only factor. The characteristics of cohorts of asylum applicants are also important, and these can differ across countries.

In the UK, Albanian asylum applicants differ from other nationalities in one important respect, which is that there is a large gender divide in initial asylum decision success rates.

How do Albanian asylum grants vary for men and women?

In 2022, 87% of initial decisions for women were positive, compared to 11% for men. Albanian women continue to receive a higher proportion of positive asylum decisions in the UK, though the gender gap has narrowed considerably since 2022. In 2024, 7% of initial decisions on Albanian women’s asylum claims were positive, compared to just 1% for men (Figure 7).

Figure 7

The Home Office does not publish data on grants of asylum or other status by reason. However, some commentators have suggested that the large gender disparity in 2022 may be partially explained by the higher likelihood of adult Albanian women being recognised as victims of trafficking.

However, this pronounced disparity in grant rates across genders narrowed, from 76 percentage points in 2022 to six percentage points in 2024, for reasons that are unclear.

How many Albanian small boat arrivals are referred to the UK’s modern slavery system?

In Rishi Sunak’s December 2022 statement in parliament on illegal immigration, he said, in the context of Conservative policy to tackle Albanian small boat arrivals, that “one of the reasons we struggle to remove people is because they unfairly exploit our modern slavery system.”

Of the roughly 12,651 Albanians who arrived via small boat in 2022, 3,021 were referred to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) by May 2025 – 24%. The NRM is the UK system for identifying victims of modern slavery. (Note that this number may increase with time as more people from this cohort are identified as potential victims of modern slavery and referred to the NRM.) Of all small boat arrivals in 2022 (all nationalities), 12% were referred to the NRM.

Of the 1,476 Albanians who arrived via small boat in 2022 and had received a conclusive grounds decision by May 2025, 481 were positive (33%) – indicating that the Home Office believed these 481 individuals had been victims of modern slavery.

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to CJ McKinney for detailed comments on a draft of this briefing.