Legal Residence and Physical Presence: The Law and Practice of Naturalization in EU Jurisdictions

The relevant legal requirements vary widely across the EU, in terms of both the duration of legal residence required to be able to naturalise and the period of physical presence to be met to fulfil the conditions of legal residence. [...] 7 Article 13(2)(a) of the Nationality Law of Finland; Article 21-17 of the French Civil Code; Article 12(1)(1) of the Latvian Nationality Law; Article 8(1) of the Nationality Law of the Netherlands; Section 11(4)(c) of the Nationality Law of Sweden; Article 12bis of the Nationality Law of Belgium. [...] 48 Article 15(1) of the Nationality Law of Bulgaria; Article 16 of the Nationality Law of Croatia; Article 10 of the Nationality Law of Greece; Article 4(3) of the Nationality Law of Hungary; Article 16 of the Nationality Law of Ireland; Article 10 of the Nationality Law of Lithuania; Article 6(4) of the Nationality Law of Portugal. [...] 64 Article 16 of the Nationality Law of Bulgaria; Article 16(1) of the Nationality Law of the Czech Republic; Article 10 of the Nationality Law of Estonia; Article 7(2)(b) of the Nationality Law of Slovakia. [...] Contrary to the plain meaning of the provision, the CJEU once held that ‘the undermining of the link of integration between the person concerned and the host Member State justifies the loss of the right of permanent residence even outside the circumstances mentioned in Article 16(4)’,122 but it said this in passing and it is unlikely that this is a binding interpretation of the provision.123 On th.