Citizenship Revoked Over a Spouse's Case: Council of State Ruling

Can a person who acquired Turkish citizenship by the exceptional route lose it years later because of an investigation into their spouse and the spouse's sibling, and an intelligence note saying they "may be undesirable"? Does the phrase "before the legal conditions were met" in Article 40 of Turkish Citizenship Law No. 5901 also cover events that happen after citizenship is acquired? In an annulment case brought by a person whose citizenship was withdrawn by Presidential decision, the Tenth Chamber of the Council of State (Danıştay) answered these questions with a clear time criterion.

In its decision of 4 December 2025 (Docket No. E.2022/7067, Decision No. K.2025/5777), the Tenth Chamber of the Council of State found the part of Presidential Decision No. 5657 of 3 June 2022 concerning the claimant, which withdrew the claimant's Turkish citizenship, unlawful as regards its ground, and annulled it unanimously. The decision was given as a court of first instance, and an appeal lies to the Plenary Session of the Chambers for Administrative Cases of the Council of State.

📅 Timeline of the withdrawal of citizenship

In the decision, the dates played a decisive role in resolving the dispute. The sequence found by the Chamber is as follows:

The claimant states that the withdrawal was learned of from the district governorate, after an official procedure revealed that the identity number was no longer active. The decision also notes that the spouse's and the spouse's sibling's cases are being heard by the Chamber under separate docket numbers (E.2022/4453 and E.2022/4452).

🗂️ The claimant's arguments and the administration's defence

The claimant argued that the material ground of the act was unknown, that a justified and concrete reason must be shown when a citizenship decision is withdrawn, and that this reason must have arisen before the citizenship decision.

The defendant, the Presidency, argued that citizenship is a status based on the sovereignty of the state, whose conditions the state sets unilaterally; that Article 66 of the Constitution and Articles 5, 9, 12 and 40 of Law No. 5901 regulate this power; and that citizenship was withdrawn because it was later understood to have been granted before the legal conditions were met. The Ministry of the Interior also requested dismissal of the case on similar grounds.

The Reporting Judge and the Public Prosecutor of the Council of State expressed the view that the act should be annulled. In the prosecutor's opinion, it was stressed in particular that citizenship is a right strictly bound to the person and that, under the principle that crime and punishment are personal, the claimant's citizenship could not be withdrawn on the basis of an investigation and intelligence concerning relatives.

📜 Article 40 of Law No. 5901 and the "legal conditions"

Article 40 of Law No. 5901, titled "Withdrawal of citizenship decisions", provides: "Decisions concerning the acquisition or loss of Turkish citizenship shall be withdrawn if it is later understood that they were made before the legal conditions were met or that they were made in duplicate." Article 66 of the Regulation on the Implementation of the Turkish Citizenship Law adds the case of decisions made "by mistake" and states that a withdrawn decision becomes void from the date of the original decision.

The claimant's citizenship rests on paragraph (c) of Article 12 of the Law, which governs exceptional acquisition ("persons whose admission to citizenship is considered necessary"). The same article requires, as a general condition, that there be no circumstance constituting an obstacle in terms of national security and public order.

The Chamber accepted the state's broad discretion over citizenship, which rests on its sovereignty, and that decisions made before the legal conditions were met can be withdrawn retroactively. At the centre of the decision, however, is the following time criterion:

🔍 The ground: the collapse of three separate reasons

After recalling that an administrative act must rest on a "real and lawful" ground, the Chamber examined the facts relied on by the administration one by one. For this review it requested documents by interim decision and also looked into the investigations concerning the spouse and the spouse's sibling through the UYAP records (the national judicial information system).

1. The investigation allegation: The act under investigation by the Büyükçekmece Chief Public Prosecutor's Office dates from 22 April 2022; that is, it is later than both the claimant's naturalisation (31 January 2019) and that of the spouse's sibling (11 September 2017). Moreover, because an investigation of the offence under Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code depends on permission from the Ministry of Justice, permission was requested; the Ministry stated that the elements of the offence had not been met and did not grant it, and a decision of non-prosecution was given in the case and became final. The Chamber held that this allegation could not be treated as naturalisation "before the legal conditions were met".

2. The intelligence note: It was established that the "current intelligence work" also related to the period after citizenship was acquired, and the administrations did not show otherwise. Despite the interim decision, no concrete information, document or explanation about the intelligence was submitted; it was stressed that an act cannot be taken on the basis of abstract and vague intelligence.

3. No individual obstacle: The administrations did not put forward any individual obstacle concerning the claimant personally. In the replies to the interim decision either, no information or document was found showing another obstacle when the claimant, the spouse or the spouse's sibling was naturalised.

Taken together, these three findings led to the conclusion that the defence that the claimant was naturalised before the legal conditions were met could not be accepted in law, and that the Presidential Decision was unlawful as regards its ground.

⚖️ Outcome of the decision

On 4 December 2025 the Tenth Chamber of the Council of State decided, unanimously:

1. to annul the part of Presidential Decision No. 5657 of 3 June 2022 concerning the claimant,
2. that the litigation costs and the attorney's fee set for cases decided without a hearing be collected from the defendant administrations and paid to the claimant,
3. that an appeal to the Plenary Session of the Chambers for Administrative Cases of the Council of State is open within 30 days of notification of the decision.

Because the route of appeal is open, the published text does not make clear whether the decision has become final.

🧩 Two different pictures in withdrawal decisions

In another decision of the same Chamber on citizenship by investment, it was later understood that the foreign-currency purchase documents underlying the investment had been issued contrary to the facts, and the withdrawal was found lawful (withdrawal of citizenship by investment). Read together, the two decisions make the distinction clear:

• A condition missing at the time of acquisition: A shortfall that existed at the moment of acquisition but came to light later, such as an investment condition that was never met before the citizenship decision, falls within Article 40.
• A fact arising after acquisition: An event occurring years after naturalisation, with no link shown to the earlier period, is not treated as "failure to meet the legal conditions".
• Personal nature: In this decision the alleged obstacle concerns relatives, not the claimant; the Chamber also stressed separately that no individual obstacle concerning the claimant had been put forward.
• Concreteness: Where intelligence is relied on, its content is expected to be set out in a way that allows judicial review.

The general effect of the decision is to show that Article 40 is not a general power covering every adverse development after citizenship is acquired, but a tool for reviewing a "defect" that goes back in time.

❓ Questions from readers

For detailed information and legal support, you can contact Savun Law & Consultancy. Contact details are on the contact page, and the other articles in the series are in the Precedent DecisionsTR archive.