Pino Arlacchi (S&D). – Mr President, my group voted in favour of this report. I take note that the discussion in Parliament on the issue of asylum seekers did not have the inflammatory tone frequently used in several EU Member States.
This is probably due to the fact that, contrary to widespread perceptions, the overall number of people claiming asylum in the west has dropped by more than 40% over the past decade, according to data just released by the United Nations.
A total of 358 000 asylum applications were made in industrialised countries in 2010, compared with 620 000 applications filed in 2001. The drop is mainly due to push factors in the areas of origin. This means that the picture is much more encouraging than is usually thought.