Effective July 31, 2023, the UK government has introduced stricter “good character” rules for citizenship applications from convicted criminals who have received prison sentences of 12 months or longer.
The changes remove the previous rule whereby some criminals could be granted British citizenship after a prescribed number of years had passed since the end of their sentence – regardless of the type of crime or where it was committed.
Good character requirements now also include factors such as criminal convictions, immigration offending and serious behavior like war crimes, terrorism or genocide.
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