Is a Swiss passport a requirement for that?

You're right - I fixed my post.

Quite possibly yes. If she leaves the country for an extended period of time she may not be allowed back in.

This wouldn't be an issue if she had a Swiss passport. She could always return home.

Hm, but to bring in another issue: I have never heard of an F-permit holder being granted Swiss citizenship. F is not even a permanent residence permit - in fact, they resided in this country illegally for 16 years, at least provided the Weltwoche article is accurate. They first applied for citizenship when they were still on an F - how is that even possible?

And just because the state and the canton undermined the communal decision doesn't make them any more right (or wrong for that matter). It is not unusual that the state says one thing and the commune another.

A few years back, there was a similar case with two Serbian kids whose mother came here as an asylum-seeker, but was denied asylum, then married a Swiss in a sham marriage, while continuing to live with her Serbian husband, who was also here illegally. This blew up in their face and they were told to leave. They then started appealing, dragged their case all the way up to federal court as every court up til there had denied their appeal. This took several years; in the meantime, the kids obviously went to school here and unsurprisingly claimed that this was their home now. Again, none of them was here legally, but sure, you could understand why they considered this their home rather than Serbia. Eventually, even federal court denied their appeal and they were again told to leave. What happened then? They ran to the press, cried into cameras of every TV station, had their school/teachers/classmates send letters and whatnot to the court. And indeed, federal court eventually caved and they were able to stay legally, though if I remember correctly only the kids, but not the mother (not sure).

I am not sure if this is fair to everyone else who applies for citizenship and does so in a legal and also not morally questionable way. I'm sorry to say that. It's not like I don't see the "been here 20 years and feel home here" etc., but merely living in a country for a certain period of time doesn't automatically entitle you to citizenship. Even less so if the largest part of the time spent in this country was in fact without legal residence. It is likely that the only reason the family here was even able to stay that long is that they dragged their case for so long.

Of course that all doesn't explain the ridiculous comments as to why their application was denied, but maybe they just didn't know anymore what else to say.

Which did you have first? Pakistani or the other?

The Pakistan website seems to suggest that a person in one of the sixteen countries can get Pakistani citizenship but if a Pakistani gets citizenship of another country then they have to renounce their Pakistani citizenship.

I'd imagine British. But it was done when I was but a baby

That's not correct, I know at least three couples in Geneva where the wife has applied for (and gained) swiss citizenship. In each case the husband stated very clearly that he had no intention of ever asking to become a swiss citizen.

They're all UK academics though, perhaps who you are is as important as where you're from?

ftfy

Were they here on an F permit for 16 years?

The family here applied for citizenship for all family members. That didn't work out due to the husband's criminal record, not because he didn't want to become Swiss. So the wife tried alone. Not sure if this is actually an OK procedure...

I'm failing to see many similarities with this case. Aisha is here completely legally.

After being here completely illegally for 16 years you mean ?
Doesn't sound very complete to me. She has been rejected many many times but seems to refuse to take no for an answer.
Quite honestly the bigger story is how she was able to avoid deportation.

What an uncooth way to report about other people's unfortunate conditions.

What evidence do you have that she's here illegally?

I was under the impression that any person being granted Asylum in a country does not and never will be granted citizenship (passport) status.

One of the regulations in the application is to do with criminality - being married to a person who has a criminal record IS relevant.

The Swiss regard their "four levels of patriotism" as very important ..... first comes ones family, then the commune, then the canton, then the country. You can`t have one without the other, in the escalated order. So being rejected by the commune means rejection, finito. The commune know more about the person than the anonymous folk up higher in the heirarchy.

So a person who works 50% as a cleaning lady, lives off social help, is still learning German (after all those years here?), husband has a criminal record, ignores the local traditions (Fassnacht, am I right?) and probably other festival things, most probably is also not a member of any Verein (?), does not greet people in the village (another tradition of the land) ......... expects to accepted as a "Swiss citizen"? passport and all?

As already stated above - WHY the need for a Swiss passport? To import more family members?....... to live on Social services?

No it's not, especially when the "unfortunate conditions" were entirely self inflicted by way of a sham marriage.

Neither am I, nor my wife.

Tom

I wonder too

@Samaire13,
Your remark is irrelevant, I was simply correcting idefix's post stating that if only one spouse applies for citizenship in family cases it will be rejected, that both must apply.
That's not true, there are plenty of cases where only one partner applies for (and gets) swiss citizenship. I personally know people involved in three cases, I've heard of others.

The case being discussed here is clearly more complicated than just a simple matter of what type of permit the woman has, but I didn't think a wrong statement should go unquestioned.

I didn't write that she's currently illegal but that she was for the vast proportion of her stay in this country.

Again for the hard of reading - Samaire did a good job of translating already :
http://www.weltwoche.ch/ausgaben/201...be-192011.html

This person seems to have continually and blatantly flouted the asylum process and worse the Swiss justice system has not been forceful enough in its' deportation efforts.

She knows her fellow villagers have the final say on the passport issue, for what ever reason she has pissed them off, and continues to piss them off, seriously if someone branded you a racist in the press would you vote yes for them?

What goes around comes around, and whatever she has done has come around and bitten her on the arse, story over.

If she *really* wants a swiss passport she can just move to a kanton that is a bit less strict.

She's waiting so long anyway a few more years isn't going to kill her.

Like with so many of these 'stories' its what isn't being reported that is the real story.