More refugees saw their status revoked than protection granted in 2025
Refugee status was revoked for 340 individuals in 2025, contrasting with 87 granted protection
Far more people had their refugee status revoked in 2025 than were granted refugee status, figures tabled in parliament show.
A total of 340 people had their refugee status revoked, with 335 cases linked to the expiry of their international protection, Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri said in response to parliamentary questions by PN MP Jerome Caruana Cilia.
The minister referred to subsidiary legislation which states that a person’s international protection will be “unequivocally renounced” if they fail to “renew international protection within a period of 12 months from the lapse of the validity of said protection or its renewal.”
Camilleri revealed that 87 people were granted refugee status in 2025. This was more than the 55 people who were granted refugee status in 2024.
These figures complement the fact that in 2024, Malta recorded the lowest number of asylum applications since 2010 in 2024.
Meanwhile, data shared by the Malta Migration Archive found that rescues of migrant boats by Malta’s armed forces (AFM) dropped by 90 per cent since 2020.
Malta had signed a secretive migration coordination deal with Libya in 2020.
Last month, the AFM rescued 61 migrants after their boat capsized. Two weeks later, 44 were repatriated. The minister said that this operation meant that 81 per cent of irregular migrants who arrived in Malta this year have been returned to their country of origin.