Italian citizenship by marriage, for a couple living in Morocco

The rule is in article 5 of law no. 91 of 1992. The foreign or stateless spouse of an Italian citizen can acquire citizenship after two years of legal residence in Italy after the marriage, or three years after the date of the marriage if living abroad.

These terms are halved where the couple has children born to or adopted by them. The Casablanca consulate puts it this way: eighteen months, with minor children of the couple.

Nothing happens on its own. Citizenship is granted by a decree of the Minister of the Interior, on the applicant's request.

The marriage has to hold until the end. On the day the decree is adopted, it must not have been dissolved, annulled or ended in its civil effects, and the spouses must not be legally separated.

What follows applies to marriages from 27 April 1983. For a wife who married an Italian before that date, a different rule applies, which the Casablanca consulate's page describes.

The Casablanca consulate sets out where the three years start. If the spouse is Italian by descent, iure sanguinis, they start from the marriage. If the spouse became Italian by naturalisation after the marriage, they start from the date of that naturalisation.

On that page's reading, years of marriage lived before the spouse became Italian do not count towards it.

A marriage celebrated in Morocco must already be transcribed in an Italian comune when the application is made. It is transcribed in the comune where the Italian spouse last lived, or where they are registered in AIRE, the register of Italians living abroad.

That transcription can depend on others, and the two offices, Casablanca and Rabat, describe them the same way. If the Italian spouse was born abroad, their own birth has to be transcribed in Italy first. Any earlier marriage, and the divorce that ended it, has to be transcribed before this one.

The Moroccan marriage act is apostilled and translated into Italian. It must show both spouses' names, dates and places of birth. Where something is missing, a supplementary correction act from the same authority is needed, also apostilled and translated.

The offices also describe the validation of a marriage. Before Morocco's 2004 family code, through an adoul attestation that the marriage exists. After 2004, through a court judgment validating the marriage, when the act could not be drawn up in time.

The Casablanca consulate adds that a marriage celebrated by proxy cannot be transcribed.

None of this is sorted out at the citizenship application. It is the condition for being able to make it.

An earlier divorce is part of this chain. A Moroccan divorce judgment takes effect in Italy once transcribed in the Italian comune's registers, and the comune's civil registrar decides on the transcription.

Italian law recognises a foreign judgment without any court case in Italy when its conditions are met. Among them: the judgment is final where it was given, the rights of the defence were respected, and its effects are not contrary to public order.

So both offices ask for proof that the divorce is final. The Casablanca consulate adds that a revocable divorce needs an act of irrevocability, and that a divorce attestation alone is not accepted where a court gave judgment. It also asks for an apostille on the translation.

The Casablanca consulate asks that the Italian spouse be resident and registered in AIRE in the same consular district, and live at the same address as the applicant. If not, the reason has to be documented, for example work, the children's schooling or medical care.

The law requires Italian at B1 or above on the Common European Framework of Reference. It is shown by a certificate from a recognised certifying body, or a school or university qualification from an institution recognised by the Italian ministries. The Casablanca consulate's page gives the bodies it accepts.

In Morocco, the Italian Cultural Institute in Rabat is an official exam centre for the CILS, the certificate of the University for Foreigners of Siena. Its page, checked on 30 October 2026, says sessions are held every year in June and December, with registration at least forty days ahead.

Since a 2025 ruling of the Constitutional Court, a person whose ability to learn a language is seriously limited by age, illness or disability is exempt from this proof, on a certificate from a public health facility.

The law closes the door in a few specific cases: a conviction for crimes against the State; a conviction in Italy for an intentional offence with a maximum sentence of at least three years; a conviction abroad to more than a year for a non-political offence, once recognised in Italy; proven security grounds. Rehabilitation lifts the bar. While a prosecution for one of those offences is pending, the acquisition is suspended.

The Casablanca consulate asks for criminal record certificates from the country of origin, from every other country lived in since age fourteen, and from every country of citizenship, issued within six months.

Each foreign document is apostilled and translated into Italian. According to the same page, the translation itself must be apostilled by the Moroccan authorities, unless it was apostilled or legalised by an Italian authority.

Names and dates go into the application exactly as they appear on the foreign acts. Any difference is explained with a document.

The application is made online, on the Ministry of the Interior's portal, and goes to the office for the applicant's place of residence: from Morocco, the Italian consular office; from Italy, the Prefettura.

The Casablanca consulate stresses one point. The email address given in the application counts as the applicant's chosen legal address, and requests for documents, appointments and the decree arrive only that way.

If the file is incomplete, the office asks for it to be completed and the time stops until then. If what follows is still not enough, the application is declared inadmissible.

According to the Casablanca consulate, once the application is accepted, the applicant is called in to sign and hand over every original. The consulate keeps them, except the passport and the language certificate.

The Ministry of the Interior alone decides. The law gives it twenty-four months from the application, extendable to thirty-six.

A refusal comes as a reasoned decree. A refused application can only be made again after five years.

When the decree is notified, the Casablanca consulate asks for a new full marriage act and a new criminal record certificate, dated after the decree. The marriage must still hold at that point.

The oath is taken within six months of notification, before the competent consular office. Without the oath in that time, the decree has no effect. The law exempts a person who cannot take it because of a serious, certified disability.

Italian citizenship takes effect the day after the oath.

The Moroccan nationality code provides for losing Moroccan nationality only in specific cases, such as a renunciation authorised by decree.

The couple's children born in Morocco are a separate question: the 2025 rule on passing Italian citizenship to a child born abroad. Our page on a child born in Morocco to an Italian parent explains it.

The application goes to the office for where you live: the Embassy of Italy in Rabat for the Rabat Salé area and the nearby provinces of Skhirat Témara, Khémisset, Tiflet and Rommani, the Consulate General in Casablanca for almost all the rest of Morocco. The Embassy's page gives the exact list for its district.

The points credited here to the Casablanca consulate come from its page on citizenship by marriage, which is in Italian. The Ministry of the Interior decides on citizenship. For a marriage or a divorce, the Italian comune does the transcription.

If a situation is disputed or unclear, the profession to ask is a lawyer.

We cannot tell you whether you qualify. If you are not sure which office is yours or which page applies to you, write to us: we read it, and a person replies.