The European Union on Wednesday issued updated guidelines for assessing asylum claims by Syrian nationals, reflecting the shifting situation in Syria a year after the fall of Bashar al Assad regime.
The changes could affect the outcomes of applications from roughly 110,000 Syrians still awaiting a decision at the end of September.
According to the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA), political opponents of Assad and those evading military service “are no longer at risk of persecution.”
While decisions on asylum applications are made at a national level, the agency's guidance is used to inform the 27 EU member states, as well as Norway and Switzerland.
The goal is to create greater coherence between the 29 nations granting international protection, according to the agency.
Decline in applications
The EUAA said asylum claims from Syrians have fallen sharply since Assad’s ouster.
The number of Syrians went down from 16,000 in October 2024, before the fall of Assad, to 3,500 in September 2025.
Still, Syrians had the largest number of cases awaiting a decision at first instance.
At least 14 EU countries have already paused processing Syrian applications, arguing that many refugees are willing to return home, the report noted.
However, the EUAA report says only one-third of Syrians in Europe intend to return in the long term, and just six percent plan to do so soon, citing slow economic recovery and ongoing risks.
Syria’s conflict that began in March 2011 killed nearly half a million people and displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million.
More than five million Syrians fled the country as refugees. While most sought refuge in neighbouring countries like Türkiye, many also went to Europe, contributing to the continent's refugee crisis in 2015.
The agency said it now considers Damascus, the capital, to be safe.
Since the fall of Assad last December, more than one million people have returned to Syria and nearly two million internally displaced people have returned to their regions, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
