£1,012 child citizenship fee confirmed unlawful by Court of Appeal
Upholding an earlier High Court decision, the Court of Appeal has confirmed that the Home Office’s £1,012 fee for registering children as British citizens is unlawful.
Blog
Alien in one’s own country?
The Danish Institute for Human Rights (DIHR) recently published a report based on a study on access to Danish citizenship for children and young persons who are born and/or raised in Denmark. The report recommends Danish law to be amended with a view to provide for facilitated access to Danish citizenship for 1.5, second and third generation of immigrant descent.
Blocked access to citizenship: home, foreign home
Early in the morning of 28 January, heavily armed police escorted four children of rejected asylum seekers (three minor girls and a boy) to the airport from where they were deported to Georgia and Armenia. The incident caused widespread protests because the children had been living and attending school in Austria for many years and were considered well integrated. The social democratic governor of Carinthia, Peter Kaiser, and others called for a debate on ius soli, the attribution of citizenship by birth in the territory.
Moldova Repeals its Short-lived but Controversial Citizenship by Investment Scheme
In 2016, Moldova joined a growing group of countries offering citizenship by investment (CBI) schemes. However, in 2020, the parliament repealed the amendments to Moldova’s citizenship law that permitted CBI, the same year that Cyprus also repealed its CBI scheme. Why was Moldova’s foray into CBI so short-lived?
Citizenship, Migration and Mobility in a Pandemic: A Global Study of COVID-19 Restrictions on Human Movement
Governments worldwide have taken an unprecedented array of measures affecting human mobility to curb the spread of COVID-19. Examples include evacuations, lockdowns and travel restrictions. Some states have applied these public health measures only to those with citizenship status, while others have included long-term foreign residents and settled migrants. Our project examines these choices and how they challenge our understanding of citizenship, migration and mobility.
Protecting the right to a nationality for children of same-sex couples in the EU – A key issue before the CJEU in V.M.A. v Stolichna Obsthina (C-490/20)
The enjoyment of LGBTIQ* rights varies across Europe. As a result, rainbow families in Europe (families where a child has at least one parent who identifies themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex or queer) can face problems with recognition of civil status, birth registration and access to birth certificates, leaving some children in these families either stateless or at risk of statelessness. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) will now have an opportunity to address this issue in a case concerning a child born to same-sex parents in Spain, for which a hearing is due to take place next week.
CJEU asked to rule on recognition of birth certificate of child born to same-sex couple as proof for nationality
On 2 October 2020, the Administrative Court of the City of Sofia in Bulgaria requested a preliminary ruling from the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in the case C-490/20 V.M.A. v. Stolichna Obsthina, Rayon ‘Pancharevo’ (Sofia municipality, ‘Pancharevo’ district), concerning the recognition of a birth certificate mentioning two women as parents in order to get proof of nationality.
A victory for human rights in Zhao v. the Netherlands (the ‘Denny case’): Nationality from birth, without exceptions
In its first-ever decision on the right to nationality, issued in late December, the UN Human Rights Committee calls on the Netherlands to enact a framework for addressing statelessness that puts human rights first.
How cities and regions are turning immigrants into citizens – whatever the central governments may think
Traditionally understudied by scholars of social policy, migration and territorial politics, the rescaling of socio-economic and cultural policies to the subnational level has, combined with decentralisation reforms, turned immigrant integration, encompassing the socio-economic, cultural-religious and legal-political realms, into a competence of sub-national authorities.
The 2020 Amendments to the Portuguese Nationality Act: a big step further towards pure ius soli… and some more inclusive measures
After the last amendment, that took place in 2018, the Portuguese Nationality Act was revised once again on the 10th November 2020. These amendments involve a major revision of the basic principles of the Portuguese Nationality Law.