UK asylum system failing: Afghan and Iranian approvals plummet

Responding to the Government’s latest immigration statistics, showing asylum grant rates of just 34% for Afghans and 58% for Iranians in the year ending December 2025, Steve Valdez-Symonds, Amnesty International UK’s Refugee and Migrant Rights Director, said:

“Today’s figures lay bare the human and financial cost of the Government’s reckless use of the asylum system as a form of deterrence – trying to discourage people from seeking asylum by mistreating those who do.

“Asylum grant rates have fallen so sharply that Iran is effectively treated as if it is becoming safer and Afghanistan as if it is safer under the Taliban than it was even before they returned to power in Kabul.

“These obvious errors are the result of implementing measures from the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, legislation inherited from the previous Government.

“The impact is clear: a huge rise in appeals, more waste of taxpayers’ money, and refugees trapped in limbo - unable to return home safely, yet denied the chance to rebuild their lives here.

“This is inefficiency, unfairness and dysfunction imposed as official policy – and it undermines confidence in the system.

“The Government must urgently reverse course, repeal the harmful provisions of the 2022 Act, and create an asylum system that is fair, efficient and meets the UK’s obligations to refugees.”