Ukrainians received most residence permits in the EU last year: Poland issued 80%

In 2019, 757 thousand Ukrainians received residence permits in the EU, which makes them the largest group among all recipients.

Ukrinform reports, referring to the news release of Eurostat.

It is noted that almost four out of five permits issued to Ukrainians are made by Poland. The main reason for issuing residence permits to Ukrainians was employment, which is 87% of permits.

The second place in terms of the number of permits received is occupied by citizens of Morocco (133 thousand permits, of which 47% were issued in Spain), the third is citizens of India (131 thousand, of which 19% in Germany). Citizens of these countries accounted for more than a third (35%) of all first residence permits issued in 2019.

The family was the predominant reason for issuing permits to Moroccans (59%) and education was the reason for permits issued to Chinese (40%) and US citizens (37%). Other reasons, namely refugee status and subsidiary protection, predominated among Syrians (65%).

According to Eurostat data, in 2019 the EU issued about 3 million first residence permits for non-EU citizens. This is 6% more (or 163 thousand) compared to 2018, continuing the upward trend observed since 2013.

Eurostat stressed that the increase in the total number of first residence permits was mainly because of an increase in the number of first permits issued for employment reasons (an increase of 214 thousand or 22%).

Last year, Poland issued a quarter of all first residence permits: 724 thousand or 25% of the total.

It is followed by Germany (460 thousand or 16%), Spain (320 thousand or 11%), France (285 thousand or 10%), Italy (176 thousand or 6%) and the Czech Republic (117 thousand or 4 %)