Article 29-1 of the French Civil Code
November 8, 2023
The seat and jurisdiction of the judicial courts competent to hear disputes over the French or foreign nationality of natural persons shall be determined by decree.
The seat and jurisdiction of the judicial courts competent to hear disputes over the French or foreign nationality of natural persons shall be determined by decree.
The procedure followed in nationality matters, and in particular the communication to the Ministry of Justice of summonses, submissions and avenues of appeal, is determined by the Code of Civil Procedure.
Any person has the right to act to have it decided that he or she has or does not have French nationality. The public prosecutor has the same right with regard to any person. He is a necessary defendant in any action declaring nationality. He must be called into question whenever a question of nationality is raised as an incident before a court competent to hear it.
The public prosecutor is required to act if requested to do so by a public authority or by a third party who has raised the nationality objection before a court which has stayed the proceedings pursuant to Article 29. The third party making the request must be implicated.
Judgments and rulings handed down in matters of French nationality by the ordinary law judge have effect even with regard to those who were neither parties nor represented. Any interested party is, however, admissible to challenge them by third-party opposition on condition that they implicate the public prosecutor.
The burden of proof, in matters of French nationality, lies with the person whose nationality is in question. However, this burden falls on the person who disputes the French nationality of an individual who holds a certificate of French nationality issued in accordance with the articles 31 et seq.
When French nationality is granted or acquired other than by declaration, decree of acquisition or naturalisation, reinstatement or annexation of territories, proof can only be made by establishing the existence of all the conditions required by law.
However, when French nationality can only have its source in filiation, it is held to be established, unless proven otherwise if the person concerned and whichever of his father and mother has been likely to transmit it to him have consistently enjoyed possession of French status. The French nationality of persons born in Mayotte, who were of age on 1 January 1994, will be subsidiarily held to be established if…
When an individual resides or has habitually resided abroad, where the ascendants whose nationality he or she holds by descent have remained fixed for more than half a century, that individual will not be admitted to prove that he or she has, by descent, French nationality if he or she and that of his or her father and mother who was likely to transmit it to him or her did…
Apart from cases of loss or forfeiture of French nationality, proof of an individual’s foreign nationality can only be established by showing that the person concerned does not meet any of the conditions required by law to have French nationality.
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is a Registered Trademark of
PETROFF LAW FIRM (SELARL LEGASTRAT)
182, rue de Rivoli
75001, Paris France
RCS Paris n°814433470
Paris Bar Registration n° (Toque) C2396
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is a Registered Trademark of
PETROFF LAW FIRM (SELARL LEGASTRAT)
182, rue de Rivoli
75001, Paris France
RCS Paris n°814433470
Paris Bar Registration n° (Toque) C2396
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