More than 17,000 asylum seekers, whose claims have been withdrawn, are unaccounted for according to Britain’s Home Office (interior ministry). The announcement came during an evidence hearing before the Commons Home Affairs Committee, which has been investigating the significant backlog of pending asylum claims.
The Home Office disclosed that 17,316 asylum applications were withdrawn between September of last year and this year, a fourfold increase from 4,260 the previous year. This comes in light of Prime Minister’s directives to clear “legacy” cases, or asylum applications submitted before June 28, 2022, by the end of December. In response to these figures, committee member Tim Loughton asked, “Isn’t it strange that… there has been a three-fold increase (in withdrawals) for undetermined reasons, people magically not going forward with their claims, and where are those people?”
Simon Ridley, the interim second permanent secretary at the Home Office replied, “In most cases, I don’t know where those people are.”
When pressed for clarification, Ridley further admitted, “I don’t think we know where all those people are, no.” As of October 29, the backlog of pending asylum applications, not individuals, was at 122,585, down 12 percent from a record 138,782 at the end of February. The “legacy” backlog stood at 33,253, nearly half of 62,157 on July 30.
