Brussels, 16/01/2014 (Agence Europe) - In cases C-278/12 and C-400/12 on 16 January, the European Court of Justice ruled that periods of time in prison in the host country cannot be taken into account for the purposes of the acquisition of a permanent residence permit or with a view to the granting of enhanced protection against expulsion. It says that in principle, periods of time in prison interrupt the continuous residence requirement for calculating entitlement to the above rights. In this ruling, which lays down case law, the Court of Justice was responding to a request from an immigration and asylum court in the United Kingdom about two cases: - the appeal by a Nigerian man married to an Irish woman against the refusal by the UK authorities to grant him a permanent residence permit despite the fact that he had lived uninterruptedly in the country for more than five years, the time required under EU Directive 2004/38/EC on the free circulation of individuals. The UK court rejected his claim because he had spent more than three of those five years in prison. The second case is an appeal by a Portuguese woman against a decision to deport her from the United Kingdom following her 21-month prison sentence for abusing one of her children, despite the fact that she had lived in the UK for more than ten years and was therefore entitled to enhanced protection against deportation. The British court asked whether, in the first case, the periods in prison and the periods of less than five years before and after prison, could be taken into account when deciding on entitlement to a permanent residence permit; and in the second case, whether the woman could claim enhanced protection despite the time she spent in prison. In its judgment, the Court stated, first, that “unlike the requisite period for acquiring a right of permanent residence, which begins when the person concerned commences lawful residence in the host Member State, the 10-year period of residence necessary for the grant of the enhanced protection against expulsion must be calculated by counting back from the date of the decision ordering that person's expulsion. Furthermore, the Court points out that that period of residence must, in principle, be continuous”. Secondly, as regards the link between the integration of a person in the society of the host member state and his imprisonment, the Court finds that, for the same reasons as those put forward in the judgment delivered in case C-378/12, periods of imprisonment cannot be taken into consideration for the purposes of the calculation of the 10-year period of residence. In both cases, the Court of Justice says that that periods in prison in the host country cannot be taken into account for the purposes of the acquisition of a permanent residence permit (five uninterrupted years) or with a view to the granting of enhanced protection against expulsion (ten uninterrupted years). The right of permanent residence granted by the directive requires the individual to be integrated in the host country and to respect that country's values, a condition that is not met when the individual breaks the rules and is sent to prison. In the first case, the court says that someone from a non-EU country, who is a member of the family of an EU citizen (here the family of his Irish wife) can only include periods of time in the calculations which he spent with that EU citizen and periods of time in prison cannot be included. In the second case, the court says that “unlike the requisite period for acquiring a right of permanent residence, which begins when the person concerned commences lawful residence in the host Member State, the 10-year period of residence necessary for the grant of the enhanced protection against expulsion must be calculated by counting back from the date of the decision ordering that person's expulsion”. (FG/transl.fl)