Romania makes the procedure of granting citizenship easier

The Romanian Government approved Wednesday, September 5, changes to the Citizenship Law in an effort to simplify the procedures of granting, regaining and rejecting the Romanian citizenship, as well as to reduce the period of processing applications and to facilitate the informational dialogue between the applicants and the issuing authorities. Thus, the structure of the citizenship commission will be modified. At the moment the applications are being processed by a commission formed by judges of the Bucharest Court, who are unable to do the job permanently, since they are already involved in judiciary activities at the court. The commission meets once or twice a week. The adopted ordinance will change the structure of the commission, which will be composed of counsellors from the Ministry of Justice. The new commission will work permanently and meet 5 times a week, if needed. Another important modification refers to the authority that takes the decision concerning the citizenship. At the moment, granting Romanian citizenship is proposed by the Ministry of Justice, by Government’s approval, which requires a complex procedure of elaboration and notification that lasts for weeks or even months. According to the adopted ordinance, the approval for granting the citizenship will be given by the Ministry of Justice, and proposed by the citizenship commission. The new ordinance simplifies the procedure of processing each application for citizenship. According to the present legislation, in case some required documents are missing, the commission invites the applicant to complete the folder. If he/she fails to present the documents by two consecutive deadlines, the application is rejected. According to the ordinance, the applicant will be enabled to complete his folder by mail, without being compelled to present himself at the commission within a period of 6 months from the notice. The ordinance also reduces the period in which the oath of devotion to Romania is being made from 6 to a maxim of 3 months. Thus, the citizenship will be obtained on the date of the oath, a ceremony that will be organised three months after the Ministry of Justice publishes the approval in the Official Gazette. Romanian President Traian Basescu stated earlier this year that about 800 thousand applications have been recorded from Moldovan nationals. However, the authorities in Chisinau denied such a number of petitioners; Vladimir Voronin stated that Moldovan nationals want to obtain a second citizenship in order to travel easier throughout the European Union.