VALLETTA, June 20 (Xinhua) -- A total of 1,928 applications for international protection were received by Malta's Refugee Commissioner office in 2016, the National Statistics Office revealed on Tuesday.
This translates to an increase of 4.6 percent over the preceding year.
However, no boat arrivals with asylum seekers were registered during this period, and only 24 people were airlifted from the sea and brought to Maltese shores.
In the context of the European Union (EU), Malta ranks fourth after Germany, Austria, and Greece when considering the number of applicants per million population.
The majority of the applicants were citizens of African countries.
Males between 18 and 34 years old made up 42.4 percent of the applicants.
A total of 1,435 applications received were processed in 2016, with 83.1 percent of applicants granted a positive decision.
Of all the applicants given international protection last year, 44.5 percent were of Libyan citizenship while 30.1 percent were of Syrian citizenship.
Also last year, 461 third-country nationals were resettled in another country, a decrease of 19.1 percent over 2015.
