USA: Documents Show Political Lobbying in Census Question About Citizenship

2018/06/11 Leave a comment

Not surprising. Echoes of the Conservative government’s approach to the 2011 Census/National Household Survey:

Documents released in a lawsuit attempting to block the inclusion of a question about citizenship in the 2020 census show lobbying by anti-immigration hard-liners for the question’s inclusion, and resistance on the part of some census officials to asking it.

The Kansas secretary of state, Kris W. Kobach, who has taken a strong position against illegal immigration and was appointed by President Trump to a now-defunct panel on voter fraud, had advocated the question directly with the secretary of commerce, Wilbur Ross, according to the documents. In a July 2017 email to an aide to Mr. Ross, Mr. Kobach said that he had reached out to the secretary a few months earlier “on the direction of Steve Bannon,” then the White House chief strategist.

In an email to Mr. Ross, Mr. Kobach urged the addition of the question, saying that including undocumented immigrants in the decennial count of the United States population would, among other things, lead to the problem “that aliens who do not actually ‘reside’ in the United States are still counted for congressional apportionment purposes.”

The documents were released by the Justice Department late Friday night in response to a federal lawsuit from the attorneys general of 18 states aimed at blocking the inclusion of the question, which was added to the census questionnaire in March.

The 1,332 pages released by the Commerce Department show a chorus of warnings from scientists, immigrant groups and lawmakers. They also includes letters of support from others who endorse the question, including Representative Bob Goodlatte, Republican of Virginia.

Mr. Ross defended the addition of the question, pointing to the documents released. “I am confident that after months of review and consideration, this administrative record proves that the return of the citizenship question to the Decennial Census is the right move that will allow our country to have the most complete and accurate census information available,” he said.

The Commerce Department added in a statement that “the notion that Secretary Ross decided to reinstate the citizenship question in response to a single email” is disproved by the fact that Mr. Kobach’s note is but one of the more than 500 pages of records produced.

Many of the letters in the documents released support the legal justification for the inclusion of the question. Mr. Goodlatte, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said it was necessary to uphold Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits United States citizens from being denied the right to vote because of race.

“In order to best enforce this prohibition, an accurate enumeration of the number of citizens in America should be conducted, and the most accurate such enumeration would be one in which a question regarding citizenship were reinstated starting with the 2020 census,” Mr. Goodlatte wrote.

Arthur Gary, the general counsel in the Justice Department’s justice management division, also invoked the enforcement of that Act as reason to include the question, according to the documents.

But there were also detailed scientific arguments opposing it, according to an analysis conducted by John M. Abowd, the chief scientist and associate director for research and methodology at the United States Census Bureau, that was included in the documents. The impact of asking about citizenship would be “major potential quality and cost disruptions,” it asserted.

The research also showed that the cost of adding this question, Mr. Abowd said, would be at least an additional $27.5 million, which would cover Census Bureau personnel having to track down households that did not respond.

“We believe that $27.5 million is a conservative estimate because the other evidence cited in this report suggests that the differences between citizen and noncitizen response rates and data quality will be amplified during the 2020 census compared to historical levels,” Mr. Abowd wrote in a Jan. 19 memo.

The Census Scientific Advisory Committee, a group of academics and scientists mandated to review the census by the Congress, also strongly disagreed with the inclusion of the question. “We hold the strong opinion that including citizenship in the 2020 census would be a serious mistake which would result in a substantial lowering of the response rate,” the committee said.

“These documents make clear what we already knew — career staff at the Census Bureau warned the political leadership at the Commerce Department that the inclusion of a citizenship question would depress census response rates, increase costs and diminish the quality of census data,” said Vanita Gupta, chief executive of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.

Ms. Gupta said that the release showed political meddling by Mr. Kobach and Mr. Bannon in the census process.

The office of Mr. Kobach did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Nor did Mr. Bannon immediately respond.

In response to the release of the documents, Representative Elijah Cummings, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, asked Trey Gowdy, the committee chairman, to subpoena the Commerce and Justice Departments. He said the Justice Department omitted “entire categories of requested documents.”

This spring Mr. Cummings and other committee members asked both departments for any and all conversations, analyses and documentation related to the citizenship question, including the impact it could have on census response rates and costs. They wanted to know who worked on the issue and whether anyone expressed concerns, inside or outside of government. They specifically asked the Justice Department for all communications related to how the question would help enforce the Voting Rights Act.

The Justice Department is reviewing the document requests it received this spring from the House, but the information it produced Friday night was for the lawsuit and unrelated to the Oversight Committee’s efforts to obtain information.

A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment on Mr. Cummings’s statement.

Republican committee members have said they support production of the documents and would vote to subpoena for more information if necessary.

The citizenship question has not been on a decennial census since 1950. It has been on the annual American Community Survey, however, since 2005, but that goes to fewer households, rather than the entire country.

The lawsuit filed in April by 18 attorneys general, six cities and the United States Conference of Mayors — led by New York — argued that the question would result in an undercount, which would not only “fatally undermine the accuracy of the 2020 census, but will jeopardize critical federal funding needed by states and localities to provide services and support for millions of residents.”

“Further,” the suit continued, “it will deprive historically marginalized immigrant communities of critical public and private resources over the next 10 years.”

A subsequent lawsuit was filed last week by the American Civil Liberties Union and other immigrant rights groups, charging that asking the citizenship question thwarts the constitutional mandate to accurately count the United States population.

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IRCC Departmental Plan 2018-19: Citizenship

2018/06/08 2 Comments

The new framing of citizenship places citizenship outside of integration in the 2018-19 Departmental plan, viewing citizenship as more operational in nature rather than key to integration.

Moreover, the plan includes an incorrect naturalization rate of 85.8 percent for the 2016 Census rather than a more accurate rate of 30.5 percent, given their methodology using the four-year residency requirement for the full 2011-16 period without accounting for the fact that the three-year residency requirement was in effect  until May 28, 2015 (my detailed analysis in my article, What the census tells us about citizenship).

This will likely come back to haunt IRCC and StatsCan in 2021 as using the same methodology would mean assuming a three-year residency period for the entire 2016-20 period, despite the four-year period being in effect for 649 days, or about 35 percent of the time.

And of course by overstating naturalization rate now, and understating in 2021 (assuming they are consistent in their methodology), the decline will appear larger.

I look forward to doing the analysis then!

Summary chart below:

Metropolis 2018 - Citizenship.025.png

Core Responsibility 3: Citizenship and Passports

IRCC promotes the rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizenship, and issues secure and internationally recognized Canadian citizenship and travel documents so that Canadians can participate fully in civic society and so that travel is facilitated across borders while contributing to international and domestic security.

 The Department is consulting with Indigenous organizations and Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada to update in 2018–2019, through a legislative amendment, the Oath of Citizenship to include reference to respecting treaties with Canada’s Indigenouspeoples. This is also in response to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action.

To improve the client experience, the Department is also working in collaboration with the Canadian Digital Service to improve flexibility in accessing citizenship tests and ceremonies. Furthermore, the Department is considering additional enhancements in 2018–2019 which could allow more electronic accessibility options.

Planned result: Eligible permanent residents become Canadian citizens

Departmental Result Indicators

Targets

Date to achieve targets

2014–15 Actual results

2015–16 Actual results

2016–17 Actual results

Percentage of permanent residents who become Canadian citizens

≥ 85%

2021 (every five years)

85.6% (2011)

85.6% (2011)

85.8% (2016)

Percentage of citizenship applications that are processed within service standards18

≥ 80%

End of each FY

N/A

N/A

90%

Percentage of citizenship applicants who report they were satisfied overall with the services they received19

≥ 90%

 page23image2913264

End of each CY

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Changes to UK law may provide more dual citizenship drama – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

2018/06/06 Leave a comment

The never-ending saga of dual citizenship and the Australian Constitution:

As the apocryphal Chinese idiom goes, we live in interesting times. We can give qualified agreement to Prime Minister Turnbull’s assertion that there has never been a more exciting time to be an Australian constitutional law expert.

So far, 15 members and senators have resigned or been ruled ineligible by reason of section 44(i) of the Australian constitution. That section provides:

Any person who: “is under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience, or adherence to a foreign power, or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or a citizen of a foreign power; shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a senator or a member of the House of Representatives.”

All the disqualifications under s44(i) so far have related to the first part of the clause. These involved MPs who were “citizens” of a foreign power at the time they nominated for Parliament.

However, s44 does not only disqualify “citizens”. It also disqualifies anyone: “entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or a citizen of a foreign power.”

The High Court has not yet ruled definitively on how this provision works. However, in light of the decision in the Katy Gallagher case, it appears the dual citizenship saga may not yet have run its course.

Entitled to the rights or privileges

Citizenship is a little like herpes: you might not even know you have it. One can contract the “rights and privileges” of citizenship without showing any outward symptoms.

What are the symptoms of being “entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or a citizen”? In Nick Xenophon’s case, the High Court had to consider whether being a British overseas citizen disqualified a person under s44(i). It held it did not.

The then senator remained eligible to sit in Parliament because British overseas citizens were, essentially, only “second-class” citizens. The High Court found: “… a BOC [British Overseas Citizen] does not have the right of abode in the United Kingdom. The right of abode includes the right to enter and to reside in the country of nationality.”

As Mr Fransman observes, the right of abode is one of the main characteristics of a national under international law.

Someone without a right of abode will not be considered a citizen for the purposes of s44(i). Of course, this implies its opposite. Anyone who has a “right of abode” might fall foul of the second part of s44(i). Despite technically not being a citizen, they may be found to be “entitled to the rights and privileges of a subject or citizen”.

What is a right of abode?

Since 1983, the only way to obtain a right of abode in the UK has been to become a British citizen. People with a right of abode in the UK are exempt from customs control. They may work, live, own property and register to vote in the UK. In a deeply ironic twist, they may also stand for office.

One does not need to do anything to obtain the right of abode. The UK Home Office explains: “The right of abode is a statutory right which a person either has or does not have…”

And as we learned in the Canavan decision, when it comes to s44, ignorance is no excuse.

Contracting a right of abode

Prior to 1983, British citizenship was patrilineal; a fancy way of saying deeply sexist. Only your father could pass it on. It took a change to the law in the British Nationality Act, which came into force in 1983, for women to be able pass British citizenship to their children.

Section 44 casualties

This is where it gets complicated — and interesting. The operation of section 37 of the British Nationality Act and section 2 of the Immigration Act together mean that anyone born in a Commonwealth country before 1983 to a parent who is a UK citizen is granted a “right of abode” in the UK. Australia, of course, is a Commonwealth country.

If your father was a British citizen, or you were born after 1983, nothing changes. You would have been a British citizen by descent anyway, which means you already had a right of abode in the UK.

However, if your mother was a British citizen, and you were born prior to 1983, the British Nationality Act operates retrospectively to grant you a right of abode in the UK.

For many people, this newly discovered right will come as a welcome surprise. MPs born before 1983, who believed that they were not caught by s44(i) because only their mother was a British citizen, may find the surprise far less welcome.

Another round of section 44 cases?

One of the few things Mr Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten will agree on is that predicting how the High Court will rule is a mug’s game.

We will not know whether those who possess a “right of abode” in the UK will be excluded by operation of s44(i) until the High Court explicitly considers the matter. Even then, each case turns on its own facts.

However, in light of the High Court’s fairly blunt ruling in Katy Gallagher’s case, some MPs who may have inherited more than just an inexplicable love of Coronation Street from their mother might have good reason to be nervous.

via Changes to UK law may provide more dual citizenship drama – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

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Gov’t obliges Dutch schools to give good ‘citizenship’ lessons | NL Times

2018/06/06 Leave a comment

Basic civics appears to be the focus (“freedom of speech, equality, understanding others, tolerance, autonomy, rejecting intolerance and rejecting discrimination”):

All Dutch primary- and secondary schools are obliged to give good “citizenship” lessons focused on the “basic values of the democratic constitutional state” in a new legislative proposal by Minister Arie Slob for Primary and Secondary Education, NOS reports.

“After all, children are not born with a ‘democratic gene’,” the Minister wrote in the explanation of his legislative proposal. “Therefore schools have an important task in educating our children to know their rights and respect the rights of others.” The new law applies to all schools, including private schools. The Education Inspectorate can intervene if schools do not provide enough citizenship education. Now the inspectorate can only intervene if no citizenship lessons are given at all.

Schools have been obliged to give separate lessons on citizenship for the past ten years, though how and when they did so were left up to them. “Some do it perfectly and have citizenship in the DNA of the school”, Slob said, according to the broadcaster. “With others, citizenship is done with one lesson per year.” The Minister wants to put an end to this non-commitment. According to him, the “government aims to oblige the entire school community to make an effort to put into practice the clearer concept of citizenship.”

Under the new law schools must include their approach to citizenship in the school guide and teachers must be a good example for their pupils. There is no detailed curriculum in the law, because schools have the freedom to chose their teaching methods and materials themselves. The law does state that schools must focus on freedom of speech, equality, understanding others, tolerance, autonomy, rejecting intolerance and rejecting discrimination. Things like Liberation Day, the Wilhelmus, the National Remembrance of Dutch Slavery and the Keti Koti Festival can be used to reflect on “historical development and the meaning of living together in the Netherlands”, Slob recommends.

The Dutch government considers the separate lessons on citizenship, in addition to other lessons, to be very important given the “current situation of increasing tensions and declining ties”. It is important for pupils to come into contact with cultures other than their own during school time, and to learn to embrace the democratic constitutional state, according to the government.

The internet consultation of the new law starts on Tuesday. Anyone can comment on the law. If the Tweede Kamer and Eerste Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament and the Dutch Senate, passes the law, it will be implemented in the next school year.

via Gov’t obliges Dutch schools to give good ‘citizenship’ lessons | NL Times

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Brit denied Swiss citizenship after ‘failing raclette question’ – The Local

2018/06/06 Leave a comment

Amusing but absurd (except for Lewis). Illustration of the perils of having local communities conduct interviews:

A British citizen has been denied the Swiss passport because he incorrectly answered several questions at a citizenship interview – including one about the origins of the cheese dish raclette.

In mid-March, Lewis, a 43-year-old British citizen, attended a citizenship interview at his local town hall in Freienbach in the canton of Schwyz, where he has lived since 2011.

Read also: Swiss passport named fifth ‘most powerful’ in the world

Lewis had been told in advance that the meeting would be “relaxed talk”. He had already completed the mountain of paperwork necessary for his citizenship application and had passed a demanding written test in early 2017, achieving a score of over 80 percent.

The Brit also grew up in Switzerland. He attended a local school in the French-speaking canton of Vaud, speaks fluent French and German, and understands Swiss German. Until recently he even worked in that most Swiss of all industries: finance.

“I feel Swiss – very much so. This is my home,” he told The Local on Monday.

But the interview in March proved to be a gruelling experience as he and his six-year-old son George – whose mother is Russian – were interrogated for an hour by around eight people from the local citizenship committee.

“My son passed with flying colours, but I got some questions about politics wrong and one about where raclette [a cheese dish from the canton of Valais] comes from,” said Lewis.

Among the political questions Lewis didn’t answer correctly was one about direct democracy and another about Switzerland’s system of part-time politicians. He also failed to identify the ingredients of capuns, a dish from the canton of Graubünden made with chard, dried meat and noodle dough.

These incorrect answers were enough to see both his and his son’s citizenship applications rejected and his outlay of 3,200 francs forfeited.

“The irony is they gave my son a present at the end of the interview – a fridge magnet with the commune’s coat of arms,” Lewis noted wryly.

Lewis admits he was probably distracted during the interview because he had just opened his new coffee shop in Zurich the day before. But he also expressed his frustration about the citizenship process.

“I had already passed the written test and shown I understand the Swiss political system and society so I don’t know why they were testing me again at the interview,” he said.

“From day one, when I went to pick up the forms, there was a great degree of animosity, with the woman at the town hall speaking to me very loudly and very quickly in Swiss German. You are dealing with people who want to make things difficult for you,” the banker-turned barista said to The Local of the citizenship application process.

“The fact that I had my six-year-old son next to me during the interview is also indicative of the degree of interrogation,” he added.

Lewis was keen to stress he respects how things are done in Switzerland and lives by the rule of ‘when in Rome’. But he also said that the process had affected him at an emotional level.

“I respect the laws of this country. I am a business person living in Switzerland. I pay taxes here and now I employ Swiss people. But it all seems a little bit arbitrary. I think they are looking for signs of non-integration,” he explained.

“Now I find myself thinking: ‘What do I say to my son? And what am I to this country?”

Lewis also believes there is a broader issue at stake: “This affects a lot of people and is a reflection on society. Do you want people to integrate or do you want to make it too painstaking and expensive for them?” he asked.

“I didn’t want to go public but I am not an isolated case. There must be lots of other people who were just as shocked as I am when they failed the test but we don’t know their stories,” Lewis told The Local.

via Brit denied Swiss citizenship after ‘failing raclette question’ – The Local

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Citizenship for sale: how tycoons can go shopping for a new passport | The Guardian

2018/06/04 Leave a comment

Best overview and analysis I have seen to date:

It’s the must-have accessory for every self-respecting 21st-century oligarch, and a good many mere multimillionaires: a second – and sometimes a third or even a fourth – passport.

Israel, which helped Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich out of a spot of bother this week by granting him citizenship after delays in renewing his expired UK visa, offers free nationality to any Jewish person wishing to move there.

But there are as many as two dozen other countries, including several in the EU, where someone with the financial resources of the Chelsea football club owner could acquire a new nationality for a price: the global market in citizenship-by-investment programmes – or CIPs as they are commonly known – is booming.

The ‘golden visa’ deal: ‘We have in effect been selling off British citizenship to the rich’
Read more
The schemes’ specifics – and costs, ranging from as little as $100,000 (£74,900) to as much as €2.5m (£2.19m) – may vary, but not the principle: in essence, wealthy people invest money in property or businesses, buy government bonds or simply donate cash directly, in exchange for citizenship and a passport.

Some do not offer citizenship for sale outright, but run schemes usually known as “golden visas” that reward investors with residence permits that can eventually lead – typically after a period of five years – to citizenship.

The programmes are not new, but are growing exponentially, driven by wealthy private investors from emerging market economies including China, Russia, India, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil, as well as the Middle East and more recently Turkey.

The first launched in 1984, a year after young, cash-strapped St Kitts and Nevis won independence from the UK. Slow to take off, it accelerated fast after 2009 when passport-holders from the Caribbean island nation were granted visa-free travel to the 26-nation Schengen zone.

For poorer countries, such schemes can be a boon, lifting them out of debt and even becoming their biggest export: the International Monetary Fund reckons St Kitts and Nevis earned 14% of its GDP from its CIP in 2014, and other estimates put the figure as high as 30% of state revenue.

Wealthier countries such as Canada, the UK and New Zealand have also seen the potential of CIPs (the US EB-5 programme is worth about $4bn a year to the economy) but sell their schemes more around the attractions of a stable economy and safe investment environment than on freedom of movement.

Experts from the many companies, such as Henley and Partners, CS Global and Apex, now specialising in CIPs and advertising their services online and in inflight magazines, say that unlike Abramovich, relatively few of their clients buy citizenship in order to move immediately to the country concerned.

For most, the acquisition represents an insurance policy: with nationalism, protectionism, isolationism and fears of financial instability on the rise around the world, the state of the industry serves as an effective barometer of global political and economic uncertainty.

But CIPs are not without their critics. Malta, for example, has come under sustained fire from Brussels and other EU capitals for its programme, run by Henley and Partners, which according to the IMF saw more than 800 wealthy individuals gain citizenship in the three years following its launch in 2014.

Critics said the scheme was undermining the concept of EU citizenship, posing potential major security risks, and providing a possible route for wealthy individuals – for example from Russia – with opaque income streams to dodge sanctions in their own countries.

Several other CIPs have come under investigation for fraud, while equality campaigners increasingly argue the moral case that it is simply wrong to grant automatic citizenship to ultra-high net worth individuals when the less privileged must wait their turn – and, in many cases, be rejected.

The Caribbean

The best-known – and cheapest – CIP schemes are in the Caribbean, where the warm climate, low investment requirements and undemanding residency obligations have long proved popular. Five countries currently offer CIPs, often giving visa-free travel to the EU, and have recently cut their prices to attract investors as they seek funds to help them rebuild after last year’s hurricanes. In St Kitts and Nevis a passport can now be had for a $150,000 donation to the hurricane relief fund, while Antigua, Barbuda and Granada have cut their fees to $100,000, the same level as St Lucia and Dominica.

Europe

Almost half of the EU’s member states offer some kind of investment residency or citizenship programme leading to a highly prized EU passport, which typically allows visa-free travel to between 150 and 170 countries. Malta’s citizenship-for-sale scheme requires a €675,000 donation to the national development fund and a €350,000 property purchase. In Cyprus the cost is a €2m investment in real estate, stocks, government bonds or Cypriot businesses (although the number of new passports is to be capped at 700 a year following criticism). In Bulgaria, €500,000 gets you residency, and about €1m over two years plus a year’s residency gets you fast-track citizenship. Investors can get residency rights leading longer term to citizenship – usually after five years, and subject to passing relevant language and other tests – for €65,000 in Latvia (equities), €250,000 in Greece (property), €350,000 or €500,000 (property or a small business investment fund) or €500,000 in Spain (property, and you have to wait 10 years to apply for citizenship).

Rest of the world

Thailand offers several “elite residency” packages costing $3,000-$4,000 a year for up to 20 years residency, some including health checkups, spa treatments and VIP handling from government agencies. The EB-5 US visa, particularly popular with Chinese investors, costs between €500,000 and $1m depending on the type of investment and gives green card residency that can eventually lead to a passport. Canada closed its CA$800,000 (£460,000) federal investment immigration programme in 2014 but now has a similar residency scheme, costing just over CA$1m, for “innovative start-ups”, as well as regional schemes in, for example, Quebec. Australia requires an investment of AU$1.5m (£850,000) and a net worth of AU$2.5m for residency that could, eventually, lead to citizenship, and New Zealand – popular with Silicon Valley types – an investment of up to NZ$10m (£5.2m).

via Citizenship for sale: how tycoons can go shopping for a new passport | World news | The Guardian

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Uproar in Lebanon over ‘naturalization’ granting hundreds citizenship – Al Arabiya English

2018/06/04 Leave a comment

Speaks for itself:

A controversial decree granting citizenship to 375 foreigners has sent ripples across Lebanon in the last 48 hours after news emerged that President Michel Aoun signed the resolution along with Prime Minister designate Saad al-Hariri and caretaker Interior Minister Nouhad Mashnouq.

While government officials kept silent, civil societies and activists took to social media to vent their anger and criticism.

The decree, which was riddled with accusations of bribery, grants Lebanese citizenship to affluent applicants including Syrians, Palestinians, Iraqis and Iranian nationals.

While MP Nadim Gemayel from Kataeb party was the first to announce the list of the names of those included in the presidential decree of naturalization, there was conflicting information as to whether the decree had already been signed.

In an interview with Al Arabiya news channel, MP Gemayel confirmed the signing of the decree according to sources close to the presidential palace.

Aoun’s office has yet to comment on the matter, with sources telling Annahar newspaper that the decree might have been drafted before the May 6 elections while the Cabinet was still fully operational. Both Hariri and Mashnouq have also refrained from commenting up to this point.

But the caretaker Justice minister Salim Jreissati confirmed in a statement Friday the signing of the decree which sent waves of shocks to a lot of Lebanese citizens especially Lebanese women married to foreigners who cannot grant citizenship to their children due to religious considerations and others related to the issue of settling the Palestinians.

These development draws a lot of questions whether if the law grants the Minister of the Interior, the President of the Republic with the approval of a majority of ministers, a naturalization decree.

The question now is about the “category” that has been naturalized, especially if it is true that they are rumored to be financiers who have paid about $ 200,000. If that is true the Lebanese are asking on social media: “Where did all that money go and in whose pocket it ended up?”

via Uproar in Lebanon over ‘naturalization’ granting hundreds citizenship – Al Arabiya English

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Bill on citizenship to be revised on issue of Ukrainian collaborators in occupied territories – Poroshenko

2018/05/24 Leave a comment

Not sure that this completely resolves the issues and concerns of expatriate Ukrainians with dual citizens or those inside Ukraine (see earlier Violeta Moskalu: Bill aims to strip Ukrainians living abroad of citizenship | KyivPost):

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko during a meeting with Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people Refat Chubarov and Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people Ilmi Umerov assured them that the draft law on citizenship will be finalized in the issue of collaborators in the occupied territories.

“There were provisions in this draft law [presidential bill (No.8297) on amending the law of Ukraine on citizenship regarding the improvement of certain provisions] that, on the one hand, protect not only the Crimean Tatars, but also Ukrainians who found themselves in the occupied territory and were forced to accept Russian citizenship under pressure. But there is a small part of the citizens who volunteered to become collaborators – started working in the police, Federal Security Service, illegal authorities,” the presidential press service reported on the results of his meeting with the leaders of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people in Kyiv on Friday.

“I heard your appeal. We have now discussed this and I decided to revoke the bill on citizenship,” he said.

According to him, the “provision on collaborators” will be deleted and the bill will be finalized jointly.

“And we will divide these two things. The first thing is the Law on Citizenship and the Protection of Ukrainian Citizenship. On the other hand, the Law on Collaborators regulates the issues concerning this, albeit small, category of citizens. They must receive an absolutely fair response from Ukrainian legislation, Ukrainian Law and state,” the president emphasized.

Chubarov thanked the president for supporting this initiative to remove the provisions that apply directly to the occupied territories. “Our goal is very clear and everyone knows it – those who violated the Laws of Ukraine and started cooperation with the occupants will be punished. And all the others who maintain dignity and remain loyal to Ukraine – we will all live together in our Crimea,” he said.

According to him, the vast majority of Ukrainian citizens who live in the occupied Crimea are waiting for Ukraine, they expect the restoration of state sovereignty and control over Crimea.

As reported, on April 19, 2018, the Ukrainian president tabled in parliament a draft law (No. 8297) introducing amendments to the law of Ukraine on citizenship.

Among other things, it foresees that the acquisition of citizenship of the Russian Federation as a result of unlawful and unfair acts in the territories temporarily occupied by the Russian administration and the self-proclaimed authorities controlled by Russia is not considered a voluntary acquisition of foreign nationality and therefore is not a reason for the loss of Ukrainian citizenship.

However, the grounds for the loss of citizenship of Ukraine will be the implementation of the electoral or other rights granted by foreign citizenship, or the performance of the obligations envisaged by foreign citizenship, which can be confirmed by the data of public registers of state authorities, local governments of foreign states and information on official websites and in official publications.

The basis for the loss of Ukrainian nationality will also be the use of a passport of another country when crossing the border of Ukraine, which is recorded by an official of the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine or another state body.

At the same time, the draft law proposes clarifying the procedure for obtaining Ukrainian citizenship and abandoning foreign citizenship.

Although, according to the website of the Ukrainian parliament, the bill was withdrawn on May 16, 2018.

Source: Bill on citizenship to be revised on issue of Ukrainian collaborators in occupied territories – Poroshenko

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Many jihadis from Germany have German citizenship: Report | DW

2018/05/23 Leave a comment

More on German debates and the question of citizenship revocation. As noted, more symbolic than more effective approaches:

The German government knows of more than 1,000 Islamists who have left Germany for Syria or Iraq to support terrorist organizations there, media reported on Sunday.

The figure comes from an answer given by the government to a question from the parliamentary representatives of the Left Party, according to newspapers of the Funke media group.

The government also cited security authorities as saying that more than half of those who had left Germany for such conflict zones had German passports, the newspapers said in their report.

The figure given by the government shows a further increase in the number of those traveling abroad as jihadis, but indicates that the rate of departures has slowed considerably in comparison with two years ago.

According to the report, 243 supporters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) have also travelled abroad to support the coalition fighting the extremist group “Islamic State” (IS). Germany classes the PKK as a terrorist organization.

Unconstitutional proposal?

Although dozens of German Islamists are in prison in Syria, Iraq and Turkey, many others, including women and children, have since returned to Germany.

The report said that during coalition negotiations between Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives and the Social Democratic Party (SPD), it was agreed that returning fighters with double citizenship should have their German nationality canceled if there is evidence of their having fought for a terrorist militia.

This plan was criticized by the Left Party’s expert for domestic affairs, Ulla Jelpke, who called it “unconstitutional.” She also told the Funke group newspapers that such a move would punish Germans who had fought alongside the Kurds against IS.

Turning back jihadis

Her counterpart from the SPD, Uli Grötsch, also slammed the proposal, even though his party agreed to it in the coalition deal.

“It is more symbolic than politically useful,” he said, saying that prosecution and deradicalization were what was needed instead.

However, the domestic affairs expert of Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU), Armin Schuster, defended the measure, saying that a jihadi who was no longer German could be sent back at the border.

via Many jihadis from Germany have German citizenship: Report | News | DW | 20.05.2018

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ICYMI: Minister Hussen announces the appointment of 10 citizenship judges – Canada.ca

2018/05/22 Leave a comment

I hadn’t noticed that there had only been four citizenship judges in place prior to these appointments. Given the increased number of applications following the coming into force of the reduced residency and testing requirements, this may help avoid the creation of a significant backlog. The usual diversity – 6 women, 3 visible minorities (by name):

Canada’s Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, Ahmed Hussen, today announced the appointment of 10 citizenship judges.

  • Joan Mahoney, full-time judge in Halifax (NS)
  • Marie Senécal-Tremblay, full-time judge in Montréal (QC)
  • Rania Sfeir, part-time judge in Montréal (QC)
  • Hardish Dhaliwal, full-time judge in the Greater Toronto Area (ON)
  • Rodney Simmons, full-time judge in the Greater Toronto Area (ON)
  • Albert Wong, part-time judge in the Greater Toronto Area (ON)
  • Rochelle Ivri, part-time judge in the Greater Toronto Area (ON)
  • Suzanne Carrière, full-time judge in Winnipeg (MB)
  • Claude Villeneuve, full-time judge in Edmonton (AB)
  • Carol-Ann Hart, full-time judge in Vancouver (BC)

All these citizenship judges and their profiles are listed in the backgrounder. Each judge was appointed to a 3-year term from an open, transparent and merit-based selection process.

These 10 highly qualified individuals were selected for their embodiment of civic values and their inspirational contributions to their communities and to Canada. Supporting the Government of Canada’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, these individuals will play the important role of fostering a sense of belonging and attachment to Canada for aspiring and new Canadians. Among the appointments is Canada’s first Métis citizenship judge.

Citizenship judges are responsible for making decisions on some citizenship applications, presiding over citizenship ceremonies and administering the oath of citizenship to new citizens. They also play an important role in promoting Canadian citizenship and civic values in their communities.

Citizenship judges are appointed by the Governor in Council on the recommendation of the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship. New appointees are chosen from a list of qualified candidates who have gone through an open, transparent and merit-based selection process. Candidates for citizenship judge appointments are evaluated against the skills required by the position: judgment/analytical thinking; decision-making; effective communication; cross-cultural sensitivity; and community standing.

Quotes

“I am pleased to welcome these diverse and talented Canadians from across the country as citizenship judges. Each judge, bringing an impressive set of skills and experience, was appointed to promote Canadian citizenship and help build an inclusive society for newcomers and welcome them into the Canadian family. I would like to congratulate all our new judges on their success”.

– The Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship

Quick facts

There are now 14 citizenship judges across the country, located in Halifax, Montreal, the Greater Toronto Area, Winnipeg, Edmonton, and Vancouver and Surrey, British Columbia.

In 2017, more than 1,400 citizenship ceremonies were held across Canada with some 105,000 new Canadians.

via Minister Hussen announces the appointment of 10 citizenship judges – Canada.ca

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