New system for stripping Irish citizenship from naturalised immigrants to come into force this year

The Department of Justice is to introduce a new process for stripping citizenship from Irish citizens, three years after the previous system was struck down by the Supreme Court.

The system will allow the State to revoke the citizenship of Islamic terrorist Ali Charaf Damache, something it has been trying to do since 2018. About 40 other revocation cases are also pending.

The Irish Citizenship and Naturalisation Act 1956 and its amendments grant the Minister for Justice the right to remove citizenship from naturalised immigrants who were granted it after living here for a period of time. This power remained unused for decades until 2015, when ministers began revoking citizenships as a result of fraud or serious criminal wrongdoing.

In 2018, a review panel was established, called the Committee of Inquiry into Revocations, to review proposed revocations and make recommendations to the Minister for final decision.

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In the most well-known case, minister for justice Charlie Flanagan in 2019 moved to revoke the Irish citizenship of Damache on the basis that he broke the oath he took to declare “fidelity to the Irish nation and loyalty to the State”.

The attempt followed Damache’s conviction in the United States on terrorism offences for which he is serving a 15-year sentence. He was accused of leading a jihadist cell plotting attacks in Europe and southern Asia. Part of his plea deal with US prosecutors involved his extradition to either Ireland or Algeria on the conclusion of his sentence.

Damache holds citizenship in Algeria, where he was born, and in Ireland due to his marriage to an Irish woman in 2003.

In 2019, while in custody in the US, he appealed the revocation of his Irish citizenship to the Supreme Court. The following year the court ruled the revocation process is unconstitutional on natural justice grounds.

The process did not meet the high standards of natural justice applicable to a person facing such severe consequences as loss of citizenship, it ruled. The judges noted that while the advisory committee did serve as an independent oversight, its rulings were not binding on the Minister. Since then, the Government has been unable to revoke citizenship in any cases.

A Department of Justice spokesman said the Supreme Court judgment has been “carefully considered” and that “new revocation procedures are currently being developed in light of that consideration with a view to their being put into place in 2024”.

It is understood this will allow the Government to progress about 40 cases, including that of Damache. This will prevent his extradition to Ireland at the conclusion of his sentence. Most other cases relate to naturalised citizens who allegedly provided false information when applying for citizenship.

The department also provided statistics on the number of successful citizenship revocations. Since 2015, six people have been stripped of citizenship. These involved people voluntarily revoking their citizenship or revocations after information came to light regarding their identity, a spokesman said.

Between 2018 and 2020, the review committee held several hearings on revocation cases. During this time it issued seven reports on eight applicants, the department said.

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