Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to prioritise visa applications for the relatives of UK citizens and residents affected by the recent earthquake in Syria.

The UK government continue to support British nationals with relatives impacted by the devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria. Where family members do not have a current UK visa, they can apply online via one of our standard visa routes, which remain available, and biometrics can be submitted at the nearest Visa Application Centre (VAC).

UKVI will aim to process any compassionate cases as quickly as possible in line with current guidance.

Should individual circumstances require a quicker decision, customers should flag this with visa application centre staff when submitting their biometrics and UKVI will consider this as part of their wider application.

If customers have an existing visa application and have been impacted by the earthquake, then they should please contact the UKVI Contact Centre, details can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/contact-ukvi-inside-outside-uk.