Migration drops near zero in Czech Republic but sways election campaign

FILE PHOTO: Czech President Milos Zeman, next to his wife Ivana, attends a news conference, after polling stations closed for the country's direct presidential election, in Prague, the Czech Republic January 13, 2018. REUTERS/Matej Stransky/Pool

PRAGUE (Reuters) - The number of asylum seekers crossing the Czech Republic dropped in 2017 to negligible numbers, police said on Tuesday amid a presidential election in which illegal migration has become a hot topic.

Although the country was largely untouched by a 2015 influx into the European Union of over one million migrants fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East Africa and Asia, fears of Muslim immigration have dominated the election debate.