Fewer than 100 people have been deported of the near 7,300 people refused refugee status in Ireland since the beginning of 2023, Minister for Justice Helen McEntee has said.
Speaking on RTÉ's News at One, she said: "This is not where we want to be in terms of physically removing people, not only does that take much longer, not only is it much more costly, not only is it much more challenging, it is less effective."
Asked where the other 7,200 are, the minister said there are "various different stages that then people can appeal...and you might have quite a high number of those in appeal."
Yesterday, the Minister claimed that more than 80% of people seeking asylum in the Republic cross the land border with Northern Ireland.
"I'd say it's higher than 80%," she said, in response to Fianna Fáil Senator Robbie Gallagher, noting that this is "a significant proportion" of all asylum seekers entering the State.
"That's particularly worrying," he responded.
The minister said that her department liaises with the UK authorities on this issue, and that An Garda Síochána and the Police Service of Northern Ireland also cooperate.
"But this is the challenge that we have, that we have advocated for no border on this island," she said.
"But it is absolutely a challenge."
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Taoiseach Simon Harris has acknowledged that the Government must "do more" to stem the flow of asylum seekers across the border with Northern Ireland.
He was appearing before the Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach.
"We have to do more in this space," Mr Harris replied. "This wasn't always the way. And, in fact, this is is a relatively recent-month phenomenon".
Minister McEntee will meet with the UK Home Secretary to discuss this "possibly as soon as next week", he added.
"A lot of focus" on people arriving illegally through airports has "yielded positive results", meaning that "the number of people coming through the airports as a percentage is very significantly diminished".
While the PSNI and gardaí do collaborate, Mr Harris said that "there's an ability to do more there".
A group which oversees the Common Travel Area is also due to meet shortly, the Taoiseach told the committee.
"We're very proud of the fact," Mr Harris said, "there is no hard border on the island of Ireland".
"But even within that construct there still has to be an ability to work and collaborate better," he added.
Mr Harris also said that the housing and migration crises are related and must be approached with that in mind.
He defended changes to the EU migration system which the Government is supporting, and the Government's approach to which countries are safe to return asylum seekers to.
"We can best help those who are seeking humanitarian assistance by making sure we have faster answers, and faster returns policies and deportations for those who don't [qualify]," he said.
Speaking on RTÉ's Six One News, Enda O'Neill, Head of the Irish office of the UN refugee agency UNHCR, said under Irish law there are measures so that if someone has a connection to the UK such as having lived there or claimed asylum "they might have their claim deemed inadmissible".
He said Ireland is the only country that has arrangements with the UK because of the Common Travel Area and after Brexit Ireland introduced legislation that allowed it to return people to the UK if they had an asylum claim open there.
Over 5,000 people apply for asylum
So far this year, Ms McEntee said, over 5,000 people have applied for asylum in Ireland and over half of those are secondary movements.
Speaking on RTÉ's News at One, Ms McEntee declined to say whether the large numbers of asylum seekers crossing the border from Northern Ireland was the result of the UK's Rwanda policy.
"We've had a significant increase in the number of checks at our ports and airports, we now have work underway with airlines, so when you start to implement various different measures you start to see changes in patterns and where people are coming from," she said.
"So the number of people coming through our airports without documents has decreased significantly."
Minister McEntee said that under new EU migration regulations Ireland would have the option of paying a set amount not to take additional asylum seekers.
She told the Joint Committee on Justice that the solidarity mechanism will see the relocation of 30,000 asylum seekers within the EU - including 648 to Ireland.
The mechanism aims to share responsibility for asylum applications to assist those countries on the edge of the EU and would come into force in 2026.
Under the deal Ireland could opt to pay around €12 million not to take those asylum seekers, the minister said.
The figure of 648 under this new scheme is separate to asylum seekers currently travelling directly to the republic.
"There's a huge amount of disinformation out there," Ms McEntee acknowledged, vowing that it is a Government priority to convey the reality of the deal to the general public.
Earlier, the minister brought further measures to stem the increasing number of people seeking international protection before Cabinet.
Ms McEntee has told her Cabinet colleagues that from this morning, international protection applicants from the country that has had the highest number of people arriving in the country over the previous three months will go into what is called an accelerated decision-making process.
Under that process, they will have their cases decided upon within 90 days.
At the moment, the country whose citizens will qualify for this faster processing is Nigeria.
Since the beginning of the year, more than 2,000 people from Nigeria have sought refuge in this country, accounting for a third of all International Protection applications this year.
Ms McEntee is taking the measure in accordance with the International Protections Act. The top country over the past three months will be assessed every three months.
She is expected to tell the Cabinet that fast processing works as it gives protection quickly to those who need it while alerting those who do not to the risks of taking the asylum route.
Minister McEntee believes the 50% reduction in applications from countries designated as 'safe' since fast processing was introduced for them is clear evidence that people who are not in need of protection, but who are perhaps coming to Ireland for economic reasons, are seeing that risking a refusal and deportation order is not worth it.
At present, accelerated processing is being undertaken in regard to safe countries of origin - the current designated ones being Albania, Algeria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Georgia, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and South Africa.
The minister has insisted that the rights of applicants are protected and the requirements of the International Protection Act are adhered to.
Call for fresh Govt 'push' on accommodation
The Minister of State for Community Development and Charities has said he is increasingly worried about un-accommodated international protection applicants and called for a fresh Government "push" to resolve the problem.
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Claire Byrne, Joe O'Brien said he would have liked to see more urgency around the situation in the past.
He said he was bringing the issue up again because he felt it was getting worse.
The Green Party TD said he does not believe that people are being left without accommodation as a tactic to deter applicants from coming to Ireland.
He added that he thinks there are potential vacant properties that could be converted for more beds in the short term.
Everyone must do everything in their power to get people off the streets, he said, adding that he believed the new Taoiseach could inject fresh impetus into the search for accommodation.
