Author
The SRC is not aware of any report of pushbacks in 2025.
Border monitoring
There is no border monitoring system in place in Switzerland.
Legal access to the territory
Third country nationals can apply for a humanitarian visa.[1] The procedure for humanitarian visas is not directly linked to the asylum procedure. People who apply for a humanitarian visa are therefore not automatically asylum applicants. However, they usually apply for asylum after entering the country. The practice is very restrictive: in 2025, out of 1,299 applications, only 227 were accepted. The most relevant countries in terms of applications were Afghanistan, Palestine and Iran. 33 of the accepted applications were from Afghanistan, 176 from Palestine and only 1 from Iran.[2]
The Swiss government offers around 800 places for resettlement per year. In view of improving planning, the Federal Council intends to adopt a resettlement programme every two years within the range of 1,500 to 2,000 refugees. On 16 June 2023, the Federal Council approved the admission of up to 1,600 particularly vulnerable refugees for 2024/2025.[3] As of December 2022, the Swiss government has announced a temporary halt to the resettlement program. The government claimed that there was insufficient capacity to accept more persons under this scheme.[4] In 2024, no resettlement took place.[5] At the end of April 2025, the government announced an extension of the resettlement program until the end of 2027. However, it committed to accepting only half of the originally planned 800 people per year. In the second half of 2025, entry was planned for 45 individuals.[6]
In 2025, Switzerland agreed to take in 20 children (of 4’000 children identified by the WHO in need of urgent medical treatment) for treatment in Switzerland. Seven children and their accompanying person(s) flew in in October 2025. The accompanying person(s) will undergo an asylum procedure in Switzerland.[7]
[1] More information is provided by the specialised service from HEKS/EPER and can be found here in English, German or French.
[2] Information and data provided by the SEM, March 2026.
[3] Communication of the SEM in English available here.
[4] See Infomigrants, Switzerland freezes admission of resettlement refugees, 20 December 2022, here.
[5] SEM, asylum statistics (7-20), available here.
[6] SEM, Bundesrat beschliesst Verlängerung des Resettlement-Programms um zwei Jahre, media release of 30 April 2025, available in German, Italian and French; reaction of the SRC, Resettlement stärken und Kontingente ausschöpfen, media release of 30 April 2025, available in German and French.
[7] SEM, media release of 24 October 2025, Injured children to be evacuated from Gaza for medical treatment, available here.