Italy has approved a law that tightens the rules of Italian heirs to obtain passports.
Previously, anyone with an Italian ancestor who lived after March 17, 1861 – when the kingdom of Italy was created – qualified to be a citizen under the “blood juice”, or the law on the line of descending blood.
Under the modified law, which Parliament ratified on Tuesday, candidates for an Italian passport must now have a parent or a grandparent who was a citizen of birth.
The government said that it had changed the rules to “improve” the link between Italy and citizens abroad, avoid “abuses” and “marketing” of passports and release resources to erase requests back.
From the end of 2014 to the end of 2024, the number of citizens residing abroad increased by 40%, from around 4.6 million to 6.4 million, the government said.
At the end of March, when the government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni introduced the law, there were more than 60,000 legal proceedings in progress for the verification of citizenship.
The Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that the change “would release resources to make consular services more effective, insofar as they can be dedicated exclusively to those who have a real need, because of their concrete link with Italy”.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Antonio Tajani, said that the principle “will not be lost” and that the descendants of Italians will always be able to become citizens, but “precise limits will be set, in particular to avoid abuses or phenomena of” marketing “of Italian passports”.
“Citizenship must be a serious thing,” he said.