Eligible to apply for citizenship via AN with divorce/ EEA??

[heresjohnny]

Hi All,
I am confused as to when i can apply for my naturalization via AN form.

I arrived in UK 2003 August on Student Visa ( i am from a visa requiring country). In August 2007 married an EEA national and converted to EEA2 permit. Then in June 2012 divorced my EEA partner and applied for EEA2 immediately for retention of rights, which was successful in 4 months, as my ex-EEA partner had either worked or studied till the time of decree absolute. I have received that in October 2012.
I have also been employed last 3 years in a fortune 500 company and exercising my PR rights

So according to my understanding I should be able to apply for PR in August 2013 the date when i married and i became the EEA family member?

As it will be 6 years in August 2013 where I have lived and worked in UK with combination of EEA2 and Rights of Retention - which automatically converted into PR in October2012 (5 years after 1st EEA2 without applying for EEA4).

Thanks in advance.

[heresjohnny]

Q5: I'm a EEA national/family member of EEA national. When can I apply for naturalisation?

Under EEA regulations, Permanent Residence status is obtained automatically after 5 years of exercising treaty rights. You need to hold PR status for 1 year to be eligible for naturalisation (unless you are married to a BC) so effectively you can apply after 6 years of residence in the UK. Having a PR Confirmation (following EEA3/EEA4 application) is optional and is not required in order to apply for naturalisation.

You have two options:

1. Apply after 6 years in the UK. This includes 5 years of exercising treaty rights + 1 year with PR. You will need to provide proof of the 5 years (similar to what is needed in EEA3/EEA4 application). Form AN has a specific section (Q2.4-2.6) for such application.
2. Apply 1 year after the issue date of the PR Confirmation (EEA3/EEA4). In this case, there is no need to prove treaty rights again and normally just your passport (and Life in the UK test) is required.

If you hold a PR Confirmation for less than 1 year but have lived in the UK for 6 years, you can apply using option (1). The PR confirmation can only be used if you apply 1 year after the issue date.



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I think the above answers my question but I still want to confirm if I can apply in August 2013 based on my wedding date to the EEA national.

[Jambo]

Yes you can but if I were you, I would wait till October. With RoR coming into play, your case is not straight forward for the nationality team. Would be much simpler to wait till October and to apply without all the paperwork. You might also find that due to the seasonal effect when applying after the summer holidays, an application applied in October won't take as much to process as an application applied in August.