Recognised refugees and people with other protection status

We assist with naturalisation after recognition of protection and assess your status, residence periods and the evidence reasonably obtainable in your circumstances together. However, the precise form of protection and the resulting right of residence matter. Recognition as a refugee, subsidiary protection, a national prohibition on deportation and temporary protection are different legal starting points. Questions about the duration of residence, missing documents and financial circumstances also arise. A careful assessment helps avoid unnecessarily postponing a suitable application or preparing it on the basis of the wrong requirements.

In everyday language, many people are described as refugees. For naturalisation, this general description is not enough. What matters is the decision of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, any relevant court decision and the legal basis of the current residence permit. The colour of a travel document or the length of its validity does not replace this assessment.

People entitled to asylum generally receive a residence permit under § 25 paragraph 1 AufenthG. Recognised refugees and people entitled to subsidiary protection generally fall under § 25 paragraph 2 AufenthG. These residence permits are not among the residence purposes excluded by § 10 StAG. A settlement permit is therefore not required in every case for naturalisation by entitlement. The relevant humanitarian residence permits are set out in the current official consolidated edition of the Residence Act.

The position is different for a residence permit under § 25 paragraph 3 AufenthG based on a national prohibition on deportation. This is expressly excluded for naturalisation by entitlement. The same applies to temporary protection under § 24 AufenthG and other residence purposes listed in § 10 paragraph 1 sentence 1 number 2 StAG. Many years of residence and existing permission to work do not in themselves remove this exclusion.

In these situations, we assess whether another suitable residence title can be obtained or a different naturalisation route is available. Existing protection must not be given up without examining the implications. The first questions are which residence rights actually exist and what independent requirements a change would involve. The article on the required residence status provides the relevant overview.

The ordinary entitlement to naturalisation generally requires five years of lawful habitual residence. For people granted protection, the earlier period of asylum proceedings may also count. Under § 55 paragraph 3 AsylG, periods covered by permission to remain during asylum proceedings count under the conditions specified there if asylum entitlement or international protection has been granted. International protection includes refugee protection and subsidiary protection.

When assessing the timeline, the transition in asylum law from 12 June 2026 must be taken into account. § 87e AsylG refers to the transitional provisions of EU law for the change from the previous procedural law to the new rules. Earlier versions of § 55 paragraph 3 made crediting these periods conditional on recognition or the grant of protection becoming final and no longer open to challenge; that additional wording does not appear in the current paragraph 3. Older explanations must therefore not be used unchanged as though they reproduced the present statutory wording. For the specific residence chronology, the start of the asylum proceedings, the version applicable under the transitional rules and the protection decision must be examined together. The detailed article on permission to remain during asylum proceedings, tolerated stay and certificates of continued residence rights explains the distinctions.

It is therefore often wrong to calculate the five-year period only from the issue of the first residence permit. It would be equally wrong, however, to count every period before a protection decision without distinction. A reliable calculation requires information about when permission to remain began, how it developed and the subsequent decision. Where there have been subsequent asylum applications, intervening refusals or longer gaps, the individual periods need to be considered separately.

Protection status alone does not create a general additional reduction in the current five-year period. The former special three-year rule for exceptional integration has also been removed from the current § 10 StAG. Special family provisions must be assessed separately. Someone married to a German national, for example, may have a separate preferential route under other statutory conditions.

Asylum proceedings establish whether a person needs protection. Naturalisation proceedings must additionally establish reliably who is being granted German citizenship. A recognition decision is binding as regards protection status, but does not automatically provide a binding determination of all personal details for naturalisation.

Nor is a refugee travel document a general substitute for every further check. It can contribute to establishing identity; its specific evidential value depends, among other things, on the basis on which it was issued and any annotations. The absence of a national passport does not necessarily rule out naturalisation. Equally, it does not remove every duty to cooperate. This distinction is central where documents were lost during flight or the country of origin does not issue reliable documents.

Under the graduated approach to establishing identity, we examine the passport first. If none is available and obtaining one is impossible or unreasonable, a recognised passport substitute or official identity documents with a photograph are considered next. These are followed by other official documents, then other evidence and, exceptionally as a last resort, the person's own statements as part of a comprehensive overall assessment. Moving to the next stage requires sufficient cooperation and a demonstration of the actual limits of the preceding means of proof.

The full explanation is set out in the article on proof of identity and the staged approach. We review all available documents, even if they initially appear insufficient. Older certificates, family registers and school records may together explain connections that are not apparent from a single document.

For people granted protection, obtaining documents through their country of origin can be particularly burdensome. It is necessary to distinguish whether a document is genuinely unavailable, whether making contact would create a specific danger or whether the difficulties are merely organisational. An authority must not demand steps that are objectively impossible or personally unreasonable. At the same time, the general statement that someone is a refugee is not always sufficient to explain every obstacle to obtaining documents.

We explain precisely which document is missing, which ways of obtaining it exist and why a particular route is unavailable in your circumstances. Relevant factors may include risks to relatives, requirements imposed by the country of origin, unsuccessful written enquiries or the absence of a competent body. We do not ask for ill-considered risky contact solely to create documentation. We first assess alternatives and existing evidence.

Equally, not every purely administrative contact with an authority automatically leads to the loss of protection status. The decision of December 2025 distinguishes obtaining documents at the request of an authority from voluntarily seeking the protection of the country of origin again. Whether further actions have consequences under residence or asylum law remains a separate question. The detailed article on passport demands for refugees explains this distinction.

Recognition of protection does not create a general exception to the livelihood requirements. For an entitlement under § 10 StAG, it is generally necessary to assess whether the person can support themselves and family members entitled to maintenance without benefits under SGB II or SGB XII. What matters is the actual financial position and whether it is likely to be sustainable. Initial difficulties entering employment are not equivalent to a permanent obstacle to naturalisation.

The law expressly provides exceptions, including for people currently working full-time who have worked full-time for at least 20 of the preceding 24 months. Subject to further conditions, this also covers spouses or registered civil partners living with such a person and a minor child. The requirements must be specifically evidenced; just any part-time employment or an unmarried partnership does not fall within the same exception merely because the circumstances are similar.

Since July 2026, the benefit under § 19 SGB II has been called “Grundsicherungsgeld”; authorities may continue to use “Bürgergeld” during the statutory transitional period until the end of 2026. The official collection of SGB II provisions documents this change. For nationality law, the decisive question remains whether a benefit is based on SGB II or SGB XII. BAföG, child benefit or insurance benefits must not be treated as equivalent without examination.

If illness, disability, education, necessary childcare or care responsibilities restrict your ability to work, we assess discretionary naturalisation and hardship grounds. The personal burden must be explained; a history of flight alone does not replace the assessment. The article for older people, people with disabilities and relatives with caring responsibilities provides further details. For applications submitted on or before 23 August 2023, the limited transitional rule on livelihood security in § 40a StAG must also be considered.

People granted protection must also generally demonstrate the required German language skills and knowledge about Germany. An integration course can help, but is not identical to all the statutory requirements. What matters is suitable evidence and the requirements that actually apply. A school-leaving qualification or other educational records may also be relevant.

The effects of trauma, serious illnesses or disabilities can substantially impair learning and participation in examinations. § 10 paragraph 6 StAG provides for an exemption where the requirements cannot be met specifically for those reasons. Simply describing a difficult past is not enough; what matters is the connection between the current impairment and the ability to acquire or demonstrate the knowledge. An informative medical certificate can explain that connection.

This must be distinguished from the language hardship rule in § 10 paragraph 4a StAG. That rule requires serious and sustained efforts, despite which meeting the requirement remains impossible or substantially more difficult on a lasting basis. Oral language skills sufficient for everyday life may then suffice. The requirements and evidence differ from those for an exemption due to illness. We substantiate each statutory exception against its own requirements.

Where this language hardship rule applies, § 10 paragraph 6 sentence 2 also removes the civic knowledge requirement. The ability to communicate orally in everyday life without significant problems remains necessary, however. In the evidence too, we distinguish a full health-related exemption from a requirement limited to oral skills.

Members of the same family may have different forms of protection and residence rights. One parent may have subsidiary protection and the other a residence permit on family grounds; for a child, additional questions may arise about acquiring citizenship at birth. The naturalisation of one family member does not automatically naturalise all the others. Each person's proceedings require their own legal basis.

We prepare your family's applications together while keeping their different legal bases in view. Joint preparation lets us examine documents, name spellings, maintenance and possible joint naturalisation in context. For children, we check early whether German status already exists. A separate application or naturalisation together with a parent involves different requirements and may require particular attention as the child approaches adulthood.

A need for protection and statelessness are also separate questions. A refugee may retain a foreign citizenship; a stateless person need not also be a refugee. We expressly address an entry of undetermined nationality. The article on statelessness and undetermined nationality explains which evidence is relevant.

This avoids confusing questions of legal status with practical difficulties concerning documents. A missing birth certificate, for example, requires a different kind of clarification from a residence permit that does not qualify under § 10.

If your residence title, employment or family circumstances change, we update the case documents using the information you provide. Any ongoing proceedings to review protection status also need to be included in the legal assessment. Neither a general political debate nor a mere assumption replaces a specific decision on the individual's status. The effective decisions and the requirements of the relevant naturalisation route remain decisive.