Ten foreign nationals granted Afghan citizenship

The Afghan Ministry of Justice said in a statement on Monday that ten foreign nationals have been granted Afghan citizenship.

According to the statement, seven foreign nationals have applied for Afghan citizenship in the past six months.

The Ministry of Justice has, so far, finalized ten cases including three cases from last year.

“These 10 people are the citizens of different countries that, by the finalization of the Justice Ministry and issuance of the decree of the President, officially received citizenship of Afghanistan,” the statement read.

The Ministry added that three more cases were still being processed.

The Ministry, meanwhile, stated that during this period, 102 people have applied to relinquish citizenship after being granted “citizenship of a second country.”

“Applications to relinquish citizenship, from these people after review, by a relevant commission, are being processed by the Ministry of Justice. Within the first six months of this year, 178 cases to relinquish citizenship were finalized,” the statement read.

The ministry said the process of finalizing the relinquishment of citizenship for people was time-consuming as a number of ministries were involved and background checks, and identity verifications needed to be done.

The ministry also stated that in some instances, relinquishing citizenship of the first country was a condition of being granted citizenship by a second country.