Acquisition of citizenship in the European Union

The number of persons who acquired the citizenship of one of the EU-27 Member States continued to increase during the first years of the current decade, but the rate of increase is lower than that recorded in the previous decade. During 2006 a total of approximately 735,000 new citizenships were granted by the countries of the EU-27. France, Germany and the United Kingdom granted more than 60% of the total number of citizenships acquired in the Member States of the EU-27 for the period 2002-2006. Regarding the origin of the new citizens, the majority were previous citizens of European countries outside the EU and of African countries, with Turkey and Morocco being, in absolute terms, the main countries of previous citizenship. The acquisitions of citizenship by persons with previous citizenship of Iraq, Somalia and Iran are relatively high compared to the foreign population from those three countries resident in the EU-27.