Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to paragraph 6.11 of Foreign and Commonwealth Office 2019 Human Rights and Democracy report on the use of national service in Eritrea, what assessment her Department has made of the reasons for Eritreans seeking asylum in the UK since 2019; and what assessment her Department has made of the change in the level of asylum applications from Eritreans between 2019 and 2021.

All asylum and human rights applications from Eritrean nationals are carefully considered on their individual merits in accordance with our international obligations.

Each individual assessment is made against the background of the latest available country of origin information and any relevant caselaw. The Eritrean Country Policy and Information Notes (available on gov.uk) outlines our position.

We cannot comment on individual cases however our assessment states the vast majority of Eritreans base their asylum claim on their desertion from, or evasion of, compulsory national service as well as the potential consequences of such (for example: leaving the country illegally).

The Home Office publishes data on the number of applications for asylum in the UK, broken down by nationality, in its quarterly Immigration Statistics release. The number of applications made by Eritreans in each year are available in table Asy_01C (Main Applicants; Asylum, volume 1).

Latest edition available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-statistics-year-ending-march-2021/list-of-tables#asylum-and-resettlement