Major ruling will ease status of migrant mothers with Cypriot kids

THE EU’S top court has ruled that foreign parents of children with EU citizenship have the right to reside and work in the country where their children are nationals.

The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled last week that a member state cannot deprive third country nationals of the right to reside and work in that country if their children, who are their dependents, are citizens of that country.

The matter was brought before the ECJ by a Belgian court dealing with an appeal by Columbian national Ruiz Zambrano who applied for asylum in Belgium in 1999. His application was rejected in 2000 and he, along with his wife and child, were ordered to leave the country.

However, the Belgian authorities noted that he could not be sent back to Colombia in view of the civil war in the country.

The Zambranos continued to stay in Belgium and had two more children who acquired Belgian nationality.

The Belgian authorities rejected repeated applications by the parents for regularisation of the parents’ status, as ascendants of EU citizens, which would have afforded them work permits and access to unemployment benefits when they could not find jobs.

Doros Polycarpou of migrant support group KISA described the latest ruling as “very important”.

“In a very brief ruling, the court said that based on Article 20 of the TFEU, from the moment the child of a family is a citizen of any member state, and lives in that country, the whole family is afforded rights of a citizen,” he said.

Polykarpou said KISA has been lobbying the government for years to change the status of third country parents with children who are Cypriot nationals.

“They are usually single women and they need protection, some sort of secure status, instead of simply living under the status of ‘visitor’,” he added.

As a visitor, the third country national whose husband and child may be Cypriot has no right to work, nor any access to welfare or health benefits, even though the labour ministry may turn a blind eye to their employment, he said.

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