Thousands of asylum seekers in UK wait years for verdicts: Report

Refugee Council study reveals that in 2020, more than 33,000 asylum seekers waited a year or longer for a decision.

Tens of thousands of people seeking asylum in the United Kingdom are being made to wait for more than a year for a decision, leaving them in a “cruel and unjust” state of limbo, a UK charity has warned. A study by the Refugee Council, published on Friday, found that 33,016 people had been waiting for 12 months or longer for a decision in 2020, up from 3,588 people in 2010 – a jump of more than 800 percent. Overall, 66,185 people were awaiting a verdict on their status at the end of March this year, the highest number in more than a decade and up from 7,375 in 2010.