Naturalização de apátrida

ME-SPC-02 is the naturalization of a stateless person (local: "Prijem lica bez državljanstva"), a tailored admission track under Article 14 of the Law on Montenegrin Citizenship. It addresses persons who hold no nationality of any state — including the displaced and de-facto stateless cohorts left by the dissolution of the former SFRY and the 2006 independence succession (notably Roma, Ashkali and Egyptian / RAE communities). The route does not confer citizenship automatically; it is a track within the ordinary admission ("prijem") regime that relieves a stateless applicant of three of the Article 8 conditions while retaining the others. Specifically, Article 14 requires only items 1, 3, 5, 7 and 8 of Article 8(1) — meaning it WAIVES item 2 (release from prior citizenship, which is logically impossible for a stateless person), item 4 (secured accommodation/income) and item 6 (Montenegrin-language knowledge), but RETAINS item 1 (18 years of age), item 3 (ten years' legal continuous residence), item 5 (no unconditional prison sentence over one year), item 7 (no security/defence obstacle) and item 8 (settled tax and other legal obligations). The ten-year residence requirement is NOT reduced — a critical correction to any assumption that statelessness shortens the qualifying period. The route is reinforced by Article 8(2), which independently disapplies the release-of-citizenship condition to stateless applicants, and it sits against a strong treaty backdrop: Montenegro is party to the 1954 Statelessness Status Convention (by succession, 23 Oct 2006), the 1961 Reduction of Statelessness Convention (by accession, 5 Dec 2013) and the Council of Europe Convention on the Avoidance of Statelessness in relation to State Succession (CETS No. 200, ratified 28 Apr 2010). The route is operative_today and was unchanged by the 77/2024 amendment.

The governing provision is Article 14, a single-sentence rule. Native text (ME-PRIMARY-01): "Lice bez državljanstva može steći crnogorsko državljanstvo prijemom ako ispunjava uslove iz člana 8 stav 1 tač. 1, 3, 5, 7 i 8 ovog zakona." The consolidated EN rendering (ME-PRIMARY-01e Art 14): "A stateless person may be granted Montenegrin citizenship if he or she fulfils requirements referred to in Article 8 paragraph 1 items 1, 3, 5, 7 and 8, of this Law." The article must be read together with Article 8, which defines the underlying conditions, and with Article 8(2), which independently relieves stateless applicants of the release-of-citizenship condition: "Uslov iz.. tačke 2 ne odnosi se na lice.. ako je bez državljanstva..." (EN ME-PRIMARY-01b Art 8(2): the condition from paragraph 1 point 2 does not apply to a person who is stateless, or proves that under the law of the country of which he is a citizen he will lose that citizenship by admission to Montenegrin citizenship, or whose release was refused for unregulated military obligation, provided he signs a renunciation statement). Article 14 is implemented through the same procedural chain as ordinary admission (Arts 27-31) and through the Government criteria for the retained conditions: under Article 17 the Government sets criteria for the Art 8(1) items 3 (legal continuous residence), 4 and 7 (security obstacle) — the Odluka o kriterijumima (Sl. list CG 47/08...15/22) defines what 'legal residence' means and enumerates the Art 8(1)(7) security grounds. Amendment history: Article 14 has been stable; it was unchanged by the 77/2024 amendment (which touched only Art 37), so the items-1,3,5,7,8 formula is current as of 2026.