00:00Are 85% of the world's refugees really Muslim?
00:06A politician from the far-right Portuguese Chega Party, which is known for espousing
00:11anti-migrant views, alleged online that 85% of refugees are Muslim. He also claimed that
00:17instead of seeking asylum in other Muslim countries, they choose to flee to the West.
00:22Now, according to the UN's refugee agency, the global refugee population, including people in
00:27need of international protection, reached nearly 42.7 million in 2024. However, it is difficult to
00:34access precise and up-to-date breakdowns of refugees' religions. This is due to wars,
00:39economic crises, and natural disasters impacting the makeup of the global refugee population.
00:44Within Europe, Germany was the European country which hosted the most refugees in 2024.
00:50Government research from 2021 revealed that over a six-year span, 69.7% of refugees in
00:57Germany were Muslim. But these figures predate Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
01:02Now, the latest data from the UN's refugee agency revealed that nearly 7 out of 10 of all refugees
01:07and people in need of international protection came from these five countries in 2024. Although a
01:13country may have a majority Muslim population, this does not mean that all refugees who originate
01:17from there are Muslim. The main religion in Syria, Afghanistan, and South Sudan is Islam.
01:23However, Ukrainians and Venezuelans alone made up nearly one-third of all refugees and other
01:28people in need of international protection. These two countries are predominantly Christian.
01:33A UN spokesperson told Euronews that this made it unlikely that 85% of refugees are Muslim.
01:39Contrary to the claim that refugees predominantly seek refuge in the West,
01:43Germany is the only European country which features among the top seven host countries.
01:48Iran and Turkey are the top countries where refugees have sought asylum,
01:53while four out of the seven have a predominantly Muslim population.
Comments