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1 week ago | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
In recent months, several countries in Europe have announced plans, or said they are at least considering, new rules on obtaining citizenship. In Sweden, an inquiry recently proposed extending the residency requirement to eight years from the current five, and since April 1st, the Migration Agency has toughened security checks on applicants, which led to a temporary freeze on the processing of applications.
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2 weeks ago | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
Who would have thought that a tiny town in Luxembourg would have become famous for giving the name to a visa and to the largest free travel area in the world? That is Schengen, where forty years ago, on June 14th 1985, five European countries signed a convention to “gradually abolish” internal borders checks and allow their citizens to travel around freely. Here is the story of those events and what has happened next. How did it start?
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1 month ago | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
A "youth experience" scheme, a promise the UK will re-join the EU’s Erasmus+ exchange programme and a move to allow Britons travelling to use eGates at passport control are among the terms of a deal announced after the first post-Brexit EU-UK summit. Although there are no set dates for when these arrangements become effective - the finer details will have to be fleshed out in the coming months - the UK and the European Commission have agreed to proceed “swiftly”.
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1 month ago | 
thelocal.de | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
Considered the European version of the US Green Card, the Blue Card was established in 2009 and reformed in 2021 to make it more attractive for highly qualified individuals.
To obtain a Blue Card, non-EU citizens need a university degree or an equivalent qualification, have a job offer and a salary meeting the threshold set by the EU country of expected residence.
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1 month ago | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
People living in the EU have to register their cars in the country of normal residence. Each country has different rules (which can be consulted here) because there is no EU-wide law on vehicle registration. Car registration certificates are recognised by other EU countries when travelling or moving there, but re-registration is usually required if people move to another EU member state long-term.
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2 months ago | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
Europe's population is changing The European Union's population is expected to steadily decline from 2026 due to fewer births and immigration no longer compensating for the fall in the birth rate. However there will be major differences across the different parts of Europe, according to a paper published by Bruegel, an economic policy think tank in Brussels. Another key trend in Europe's changing population is that there will be a higher proportion of elderly people in the years to come.
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2 months ago | 
thelocal.fr | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
In total, 453,920 people were ordered to leave an EU country in 2024, a 4 per cent increase compared to the 435,685 in 2023, an analysis of Eurostat data for The Local shows.
The figure was 124,935 in the last three months of the year, an increase by 16 per cent compared to the same period in 2023.
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Mar 11, 2025 | 
thelocal.ch | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
EU countries granted citizenship to 1,050,100 foreign residents in 2023, the latest data by Eurostat, the EU statistical office, revealed.
This is an increase of over 6 percent compared to 2022 and does not consider the naturalisation of people living abroad, those who acquired citizenship by marriage or descent for instance.
Spain was the country that granted the largest number of citizenships (240,200), followed by Italy (213,600), Germany (199,800) and France (97,300).
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Mar 8, 2025 | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
EU countries granted citizenship to 1,050,100 foreign residents in 2023, the latest data by Eurostat, the EU statistical office, revealed. This is an increase of over 6 percent compared to 2022 and does not consider the naturalisation of people living abroad, those who acquired citizenship by marriage or descent for instance. Spain was the country that granted the largest number of citizenships (240,200), followed by Italy (213,600), Germany (199,800) and France (97,300).
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Mar 7, 2025 | 
thelocal.com | Claudia Delpero |Europe Street
The data reveals that more than 110,000 Britons naturalised in EU countries between 2016, the year of the Brexit referendum, and 2023, according to the latest data on citizenship acquisition published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU. Another 11,000 are added if those who were naturalised in Norway (3,864) and Switzerland (7,165) are included.
