Mazzeschi

Security and Immigration decree now effective

Oct 08, 2018

After being approved by the Italian Government, the Law Decree was signed by the President of Republic and published in the Italian Official Gazette (Law decree October 4, 2018, n. 113) on October 4, 2018. The Law Decree enters into force today, October 5, 2018.

The Decree must be converted into law by the Parliament within 60 days as of its publication. Failure to do so will result in the Decree becoming retroactively ineffective as from the publication date. It is to be noted that the Parliament may introduce amendments to the Decree upon conversion into law.

Main changes to Immigration law

• permit for humanitarian reasons (granted to those who cannot obtain refugee or subsidiary protection status but are recognized to be in danger if repatriated) will no longer be issued. Instead, ‘special reasons’ permits can be issued to certain categories of applicants, such as victims of exploitation and domestic violence, people from countries hit by natural disasters, people in need of medical care and for “acts of civic value”.
• the decree widens the range of criminal offenses that can result in revocation of international protection and refugee status
• migrants can be kept in pre-removal detention centers (CPR) up to 180 days (instead of 90 days)
• more funds for repatriating migrants who have no right to stay in the country

Main changes to citizenship law

• increase in processing time for citizenship by marriage and naturalization applications (48 months)
• introduction of the possibility for citizenship by marriage applications to be rejected after the 48 months period
• increase in the application fee (from €200,00 to €250,00)
• citizenship acquired by marriage and naturalization to be revoked for people convicted of terrorism-related offenses and offenses related to public security

For further information gp@mazzeschi.it