BERLIN – The government of Germany recorded the highest-ever cases of naturalization (citizenship) since 2000, it emerged on Tuesday.
The government statistics recently released imply that as many as 200,100 people got German citizenship in 2023. The beneficiaries involved individuals from 157 countries with an average age of 29.3 as compared to the average age of the German population which hovers around 44.
The county-wise data implies that the majority of newly naturalized German citizens belonged to Syria, Turkey, Iraq, Romania and Afghanistan. Further segregation of the data confirms that 38 percent of those naturalized belonged to Syria; 55 percent of the total cases naturalized were men.
“The high number of naturalizations of Syrians correlates with the high number of Syrian asylum seekers who migrated [to Germany] between 2014 and 2016,” read a government press release.
Conversely, Turkish citizens, alongside Iraqis, remained the second-largest demographic, comprising approximately 10,700 individuals who obtained new naturalization.
Interestingly, people from affluent countries like Israel are also looking towards Germany for citizenship. The government data reflects that more and more Israeli citizens and other descendants of victims of Germany’s Nazi 1933-45 dictatorship are applying for German citizenship.
German authorities announced on Monday that within the initial four months of 2024, they had received close to 6,900 applications from individuals residing in Israel. This figure contrasts with approximately 9,100 applications throughout the entirety of 2023 and nearly 5,700 in 2022.
The figures come ahead of new relaxed rules on German citizenship and dual citizenship which would be in effect at the end of June.
Approved in January this year, the new German citizenship plan involves the following changes:
- Immigrants legally residing in Germany will be permitted to apply for citizenship after five years, instead of the current eight and in case they bring special achievements to the table, this may be reduced to just three years
- Children born in Germany of at least one parent who has been living legally in the country for five or more years will automatically be awarded with German citizenship
- Immigrants above the age of 67 will be able to do an oral instead of a written German language test
- Multiple citizenships will be allowed
It is to be highlighted that the labor crisis in Germany is pushing the government to introduce more and more pro-immigration policies to attract foreign labor and skilled individuals to run the economy.
