Number of foreigners residing in the Czech Republic is rising

Prague, Feb 20 (CTK) – The number of foreigners with permanent or temporary stay rose by 28,950 in the Czech Republic last year, having reached 595,881 persons, according to the report on migration in the last quarter of 2019, the Interior Ministry has released on its website.

Most of them are Ukrainians, Slovaks and Vietnamese.

Out of the registered foreigners, almost one-half have temporary stay and the rest permanent stay. One-half of the former asked for its over employment. The reason is followed by family reunification, studies and business.

One quarter (145,518) of foreigners with permanent or temporary stay were from Ukraine, one-fifth (121,278) from Slovakia.

Vietnam accounted for 10 percent of legally staying foreigners (61,952), followed by citizens of Russia (38,207), Poland (21,767), Germany (21,487), Bulgaria (17,183), Romania (16,824), Mongolia (9,851) and Britain (8,332).

The total number does not include the foreigners with a legal stay on the basis of the Schengen visas and unregistered EU citizens.

Last year, the Interior Ministry recorded 1,922 applications for international protection, which was about 13 percent more than a year ago.

The surge was due to the rising number of expediently submitted applications for international protection by Armenians at the Vaclav Havel International Airport in Prague.

Due to this, the duty to own the airport transit visas was introduced for Armenians.

Apart from Armenians, Ukrainians and Georgians most frequently applied for international protection.

Last year, the Czech Republic granted asylums to 61 foreigners and 86 additional protection statuses.

At the end of January, the immigration office said it had uncovered 5,677 illegally staying foreigners last year. It was 685 more than in 2018. Most of them were Ukrainians, followed by Moldovans and Vietnamese.

Last year, the police caught 5,174 foreigners with illegal stay, while the figure stood at 4,653 two years ago. These were the foreigners who had come to the Czech Republic legally, but stayed in it after the permitted time expired.

Last year, 188,327 persons illegally came to the EU, most of them to Greece, coming mostly from Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

A total of 708,369 people asked for international protection in the EU last year. This mostly happened in Germany, France and Spain and the applicants mainly came from Syria, Afghanistan and Venezuela.

Number of foreigners with residence permit in the Czech Republic:

Source: Report on migration in the Czech Republic