Foreign individuals will find it harder to obtain citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, as stricter rules have been included in the legislation, which will make the citizenship recognition process safer. The changes were made to eliminate vulnerabilities and risks to the state’s security.
A draft in this regard was adopted on Friday in the second reading by the Parliament of Chișinău, as reported by MOLDPRES.
The author of the project is Deputy Igor Chiriac from the Action and Solidarity Party. He argued that the changes "are necessary in the context of the risks posed by the aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine."
More specifically, in the last two years, there has been an increase in the number of applicants for obtaining citizenship of the Republic of Moldova. Out of these applications, 70% belong to individuals from the Russian Federation, and 20% come from individuals from Ukraine.
Furthermore, authorities have identified numerous attempts to fraudulently obtain citizenship of the Republic of Moldova based on documents of unknown origin presented by applicants.
To prevent this, Deputy Igor Chiriac proposed a series of amendments to the Citizenship Law of the Republic of Moldova.
Thus, not all individuals born and residing in the territory of the Republic of Moldova, who do not hold citizenship of other states and apply for the recognition of Moldovan citizenship, will receive it. The exception concerns individuals who, during the examination period of the application, are serving or are to serve a custodial sentence under a court judgment, have unexpunged criminal records, or are under criminal prosecution.
Applications submitted by these individuals will be rejected, as well as applications for determining Moldovan citizenship or for recognition as Moldovan citizens that contain false information or conceal pertinent data. In this context, the mandatory coordination of these applications with the Information and Security Service is proposed.
Deputy Igor Chiriac also proposed extending the examination period of the applications by another six months.
The legislative changes will come into force on the date of publication in the Official Gazette, and applications pending at that time will be examined in accordance with the new regulations, as further specified by MOLDPRES.