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european The union on Wednesday released updated guidance for asylum applications by Syrian citizens that reflects new conditions a year after Syria’s fall. bashar asadThe changes could affect the outcome of around 110,000 asylum requests Syrian who were still awaiting an asylum decision at the end of September.
The European Union agency for asylum said Assad’s opponents and military service evaders “are no longer at risk of persecution.”
But the agency said other groups could also be considered at risk in post-Assad Syria, including people associated with the former government and members of the Alawites, Christians and Druze ethno-religious groups.
While decisions on asylum applications are made at the national level, the agency’s guidance is used to inform the 27 EU member states, as well as Norway and Switzerland. Its goal is to create greater coordination among the 29 countries that provide international security.
The number of Syrians requesting asylum dropped from 16,000 in October 2024, before Assad’s fall, to 3,500 in September 2025. Nevertheless, Syrians had the highest number of cases awaiting a decision for the first time.
The Syrian conflict, which began in March 2011, has killed nearly half a million people and displaced half of the country’s pre-war population of 23 million. More than 5 million Syrians fled the country as refugees. While most sought refuge in neighboring countries such as Türkiye, many also went to Europe, contributing to the continent’s refugee crisis in 2015.
The asylum agency said the situation in Syria was considered “improved but unstable” since the fall of Assad in December 2024, and that “indiscriminate violence continues” in parts of Syria.
Many Syrians had high hopes after Assad was killed in an attack by rebel groups in early December. However, hundreds of lives have been lost in sectarian killings earlier this year against members of Assad’s Alawite minority sect in Syria’s coastal region and the Druze minority in the southern province of Sweida.
Still, the agency said it now considers damascusThe capital, to be safe.
The agency also cited two other groups living in Syria who should remain eligible for refugee status: LGBTQ+ people and Palestinians in Syria who no longer receive UN assistance or protection.
More than one million people have returned to Syria since the fall of Assad in December, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and nearly two million internally displaced persons have returned to their own regions.
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