Brussels, 13/06/2016 (Agence Europe) - In 2014, around 890,000 people acquired the nationality of a member state of the European Union. According to the European Union Statistical Office (Eurostat), this is a decrease of 9% compared with 2013, where the figure stood at 981,000 people.
Since 2009, more than 5 million people in total were granted the nationality of an EU member state. Among those obtaining the nationality of an EU member state in 2014, 89% of them were not initially EU nationals.
Moroccans were the largest national minority to obtain member state nationality in 2014. Their main choices of nationality were Spanish, Italian and French. The Moroccans were followed by Albanians taking Greek or Italian nationality, Turks taking German nationality, Indians taking British nationality, as well as Ecuadorians and Colombians.
In 2014, Romanians and Polish nationals were the largest number of member state nationals to acquire the nationality of another EU country, explained Eurostat. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)