As RFI notes, the official migration statistics of the French Interior Ministry for 2015 are unlikely to please the far-right National Front and its leader Marine Le Pen, who builds her policy on claims of a massive influx of foreigners into the country. The number of residence permits issued to foreigners in France remained at the average level of recent years – 212,000 people received the right to stay in the country for the first time. As authorities had previously reminded, this is only 0.3% of the population. This indicator in France is below the OECD average for developed countries – 0.6%.
Almost half of the residence permit holders (90,000 people) received documents for family reasons. Of these, 50,000 people (or 60%) are spouses or children of French citizens. Legally residing foreigners in France “brought in” only 12,000 members of their families over the year.
Professional immigration to France in 2015 remained at a traditionally low level – less than 10% of all foreigners arriving in the country. The right to work in France was obtained by 21,000 people. Of these, almost 15,000 are in the category of “employees,” as well as 3,800 researchers.
2015 was a record year for France in terms of the number of foreign students – authorities issued 66,000 student residence permits.
French citizenship was obtained by 87,000 foreigners last year. Of these, 62,000 by government decree, and 25,000 as spouses of French citizens. The number of “new” French citizens increased by 12% in 2015.
In 2015, 28,500 illegal immigrants legalized their stay in France through a special procedure established by the socialist government three years ago. Statistics show a decrease in this category of foreigners by 11% over the year.
French consulates abroad issued 3.2 million entry visas to France over the year, including 2 million tourist visas. The total number of visas increased by over 13%, and the number of tourists jumped by a quarter.
Chinese retained the first place among holders of short-term French visas – 820,000 people. In second place are residents of Algeria (420,000 visas), in third – Morocco (260,000).
Against the backdrop of the migration crisis in Europe, the number of asylum seekers in France increased by 22% in 2015: nearly 80,000 people filed applications. The average number of applicants in previous years remained stable at 60-65,000 people.
On average in recent years, only 20-30% of applicants received asylum in France. In 2015, this figure rose to 33.3%. Refugee status was granted to 19,500 people, including 4,800 Sudanese, 3,500 Syrians, and 3,100 from Kosovo. In 2014, the first place among refugees in France was held by people from the Democratic Republic of Congo, followed by Chinese and residents of Bangladesh.
Finally, in 2015, the number of illegal immigrants expelled from France continued to grow. A total of 15,500 foreigners who violated the rules of stay in France were “removed” from the country. This is 2% more than in 2014. Among them, 6,300 were citizens of countries outside the EU. This category of deportees increased by 11%. The rest of those expelled were Europeans or foreigners registered in other EU countries.
In March 2013, the French Interior Ministry for the first time made public general data on immigrants, which had previously been contained only in closed reports to parliament. As of 2012, 2.5 million foreigners lived in France (70,000 more than the year before). 1.7 million people had a ten-year residence permit, 500,000 had an annual visa, and 150,000 had documents for a shorter period.