Georgian parliament to discuss amendments to Law on Citizenship

A draft Law on Citizenship prepared by the parliamentary committee of legal issues envisages several changes to the existing procedures of issuing Georgian citizenship.

Granting Georgian citizenship will be regulated thus: 

Those who would like to receive the citizenship of Georgia may need to reside longer in the country, perhaps up to ten years for the regular procedure. Earlier, the term was five. 

Moreover, if a person wants to receive dual citizenship as an exception, which so far has been at the discretion of the president, he or she will not be obliged to appeal to the President of Georgia anymore. Instead the application for dual citizenship through the exceptional rule will be presented to the Public Service Development Agency, related embassy or consulate.

The decision to grant Georgian citizenship to a person is taken by the President of Georgia currently. Giorgi Margvelashvili has granted Georgian citizenship to 3000 people last year.

As for the exceptions itself, a person may receive the citizenship of Georgia through if he or she recognises Georgia as his/hers home country, or he has a predecessor internally displaced from the occupied territories, or emigrated due to political or difficult social-economic conditions. 

Other preconditions for receiving Georgian citizenship as an exception include if a person is born in Georgia but represents an ethnic minority, is a foreigner and makes a significant investment supporting the country’s economic development, or is a foreigner but successful in sports, science or art and wants to represent Georgia in their career. 

As for dual citizenship, a Georgian receiving the citizenship of other country may keep Georgian citizenship in case he or she has previously permission from the Georgian side. This permit will be issued if one of the family members of the person is a citizen of the country he or she is going to become citizen of and at the same time, he or she has lived and worked in that country for at least five years. 

Moreover, those who have lost Georgian citizenship due to acquiring the citizenship of other country will be allowed to appeal to the Public Service Development Agency with the request to restore their Georgian citizenship within one year from the date the current amendments to the law are enacted.