MaltaMedia.com

15 persons from Somalia, Eritrea and Sudan, including a family of three and twelve single adult men and women granted subsidiary protection in Malta left today to start a new life in the United States, under the US Refugee Resettlement Program (USRRP). On arrival, they will be assisted by NGOs in the U.S.A. to proceed to their final destinations in various states.

This latest departure brings the total of beneficiaries of international protection who were resettled to the United States from Malta since 2007 to 1,071 migrants. Since the start of the USRRP in 2008, the number of beneficiaries of protection resettled to the United States amounts to 1,043.

260 migrants have been resettled from Malta to the United States of America since the beginning of 2012. This is the highest number of resettlements ever registered in a single year under the USRRP.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office in Malta, the International Organisation for Migration and US Government officials are involved at various stages of this resettlement process.

In all 1,730 refugees and beneficiaries of international protection have been relocated or resettled to various other developed countries since 2005 – 340 of these since the beginning of the current year.