Nearly 13,000 international students have applied for asylum in Canada in the first eight months of the year, data from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada shows.
Between Jan. 1 and Aug. 31, a total of 119,835 refugee claims were made in Canada. Of these, 12,915 were claimants who were on either study permits (11,605) or study permit extensions (1,310), the department data said.
Global News asked the department for a breakdown of how that compares with applications from claimants on study permits dating back to 2015-16 but officials said they needed more time to provide that data.
“This can take up to 10 working days to obtain,” the spokesperson said.
According to a report from the Globe & Mail in April, that number stood at 1,515 applicants in 2018, which appears to show an increase of 600 per cent.
The highest number of asylum claims from students this year came in August, with 1,785 claimants on student visas or study permit extensions applying for refugee status in Canada.
This comes after Immigration Minister Marc Miller said in an interview with Global News that a “growing number” of international students are claiming asylum in order to stay in Canada after being allowed in on student visas, calling it an “alarming trend.”
Speaking to Mercedes Stephenson in an interview that aired Sunday on The West Block, Miller said those claimants are using the international student program as a “backdoor entry into Canada,” often to lower their tuition fees, and that universities and colleges must improve their screening and monitoring practices to weed out bad actors.
He said his department is studying the issue and suggested further reforms to the program were being explored.
Miller made the comments after Stephenson asked if Muhammad Shahzeb Khan — a Pakistani man arrested in Quebec this month while allegedly plotting a terrorist attack against Jews in New York City — had claimed asylum after entering Canada on a student visa in 2023.
Miller said he could not comment on Khan’s case as it’s before the courts, but was then asked how many international students in total have claimed asylum.
“There’s a growing number, Mercedes, and it’s frankly quite alarming given the volumes of people that come to this country, in theory, with the proper financial capacity to live and to pay their tuition fees, which are four times what Canadians pay,” the minister said.
“We see that it happens often within the first year of the time they’re here … often for less valid reasons than others, notably to drop the tuition fee down to Canadian rates. There’s some opportunism that’s being used and exploited there.”
An IRCC spokesperson told Global News that under Canadian law, every claimant had the right to have their refugee claim heard, but that was not a guarantee that they would get to stay in Canada.
“It is important to note that the number of asylum claims does not reflect the quality or thoroughness of the temporary resident visa, study permit or work permit application process,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The spokesperson said while applying for a study permit, or any other type of temporary residence, an applicant must satisfy the officer that they have sufficient connections with their country of origin, particularly related to their family and economic situation, and that they will leave Canada when their status expires.
“Some temporary residents come to Canada as genuine visitors, students or workers, and then make an asylum claim because of developments in their country of origin,” the statement said.
— with files from Global’s Sean Boynton