Apply for family reunification on the Faroe Islands

Provided that certain conditions are met, family reunification can be granted to:

• spouses and cohabiting partners
• children under the age of 18
• parents over the age of 60
• other relatives or similar of a Faroese resident

Applications for Family Reunification in the Faroe Islands will be processed by the Danish Immigration Service in accordance with the terms of Ordinance 182 of 22 March 2001 – “Application of the Aliens Act in the Faroe Islands”.

Since the Faroe Islands are not a part of the European Union, EU regulations for family reunification of EU/EEA and Swiss citizens do not apply in the Faroe Islands.

If you have previously held Danish citizenship or are of Danish/Faroese descent, Faroese immigration regulations permit you to apply for a residence permit.

Read more about residence permit on the Faroe Islands on the grounds of strong attachment

If you are a Nordic citizen

If you are a citizen of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway or Sweden, you are free to enter, reside, study and work in the Faroe Islands. You do not need a visa or residence and work permit.

As a citizen of a Nordic country, you can enter the Faroe Islands without a passport. However, you must be able to identify yourself if required. Such could be the case if you are staying in a hotel or other form of temporary residence. A driving licence or debit card is sufficient identification.

If you have family members who are citizens of a Nordic country, they do not need to apply for a residence permit. They may freely enter the Faroe Islands according to the rules for citizens of Nordic countries.

If you hold a Danish residence permit

If you hold a Danish residence permit and would like to travel to the Faroe Islands to visit family, for holiday or other type of short visit, you must apply for a Faroese entry permit. A Danish residence permit does not give you the right to reside in the Faroe Islands.

Applications for Faroese entry permits should be submitted to the Immigration Service by mail. Please indicate the purpose of your visit and how long you intend to stay in the Faroe Islands.

If your spouse or cohabiting partner lives in the Faroe Islands, you can apply for a residence permit on the grounds of family reunification. However, you and your spouse/partner, as well as your relationship, must meet certain requirements.

There are a number of specific requirements relating to your spouse/partner living in the Faroe Islands (also known as your 'sponsor'). These requirements primarily concern the grounds for your sponsor's residence in the Faroe Islands, as well as your sponsor's ability to support you and whether or not he/she has adequate housing.

Below follows a list of requirements which you and your spouse/partner must meet.

Requirements to your marriage

• your marriage must be valid under Faroese law
• the primary reason for your marriage may not have been for you to obtain a residence permit (marriage of convenience)

Requirements relating to you and your spouse/partner

• you must both be over the age of 18
• you must live together at the same address in the Faroe Islands when your residence permit is granted (also known as the 'cohabitation requirement')
• if your sponsor is not a Danish citizen, your combined attachment to the Faroe Islands must at least as great as your combined attachment to any other country (also known as the 'attachment requirement')

Requirements relating to your spouse/partner in the Faroe Islands

Your sponsor must either:

• be a citizen of one of one of the Nordic countries
• hold refugee status in the Faroe Islands, or
• have held a permanent residence permit in the Faroe Islands for at least three years

Furthermore, your spouse/partner in the Faroe Islands:

• must reside permanently in the Faroe Islands, and must normally
• have accommodation of adequate size at his/her disposal (known as the 'housing requirement'), and must normally
• be able to support you (known as the 'support requirement'). This is not required if your sponsor is a citizen of a Nordic country or a refugee

Special requirements for cohabiting partners

If you and your partner are not legally married, your relationship must be of a permanent and lasting nature.

There is no minimum time limit on the length of your relationship. The Immigration Service will assess, based on all relevant information, if your relationship can be considered permanent and lasting. When making our assessment, we will consider the length of time you have known your partner, as well as any periods of joint residence in the Faroe Islands or abroad. Normally, joint residence for a period of 18 to 24 months will be sufficient to prove that your relationship is of a continuing nature. Furthermore, you must normally be able to document that you have lived with your partner for 18-24 months. Such documentation includes a lease with both your names, certificate of residence, letters received at the same address, joint insurance policies or bank accounts.

If your sponsor in the Faroe Islands is not a citizen of a Nordic country or a refugee, he/she must sign a declaration that he/she will support you financially.

Must you meet all requirements?

If you cannot claim an exemption from Faroese immigration law as a citizen of Nordic country or as a refugee, you should normally expect that all requirements must be met. However, there may be special situations in which you and your spouse/partner can be granted family reunification even though one or more of the requirements are not met.

The Immigration Service cannot make its decision about whether you and your spouse/partner can receive an exemption from one or more of the requirements until the Immigration Service has received and processed your application.

Below, you can read more about the special circumstances that can result in an exemption from one or more of the requirements.

In accordance with the Faroe Islands’ international obligations to protect the right to family life, exemptions from the following requirements can be granted to certain groups of applicants:

• the attachment requirement
• the housing requirement
• the support requirement

An exemption can be granted if your spouse/partner in the Faroe Islands has a child from a previous relationship who is living in the Faroe Islands with an adult other than your spouse/partner, and if your spouse/partner has custody of the child or has visitation rights and sees the child on a regular basis.

Furthermore, an exemption can be granted if your spouse/partner in the Faroe Islands is elderly or has a serious illness or a debilitating handicap, and a lack of adequate care and treatment in your country would make it indefensible from a humanitarian point of view to force him/her to relocate there.

Foreign nationals under age 18 who have a parent or parents living in the Faroe Islands can be eligible for a residence permit, provided that certain conditions are met:

• the child must be under 18 at the time the application is submitted
• the parent in the Faroe Islands must be able to document his/her relationship to the child
• after the family reunification, the child must live together with his/her parents or a parent who has full or joint custody of the child
• the child may not have a family of his/her own – either by marriage or cohabiting partnership

All requirements must be met.

Furthermore, the following may be considered:

• whether the parent living in the Faroe Islands has adequate housing at his/her disposal (the housing requirement)
• whether the parent living in the Faroe Islands can support the child financially (the support requirement). Not required if the parent living in the Faroe Islands is a citizen of Denmark or another Nordic country or is a refugee

If the parent living in the Faroe Islands is not a citizen of a Nordic country or a refugee, he/she will normally need to meet the requirements, provided that the parent in the Faroe Islands has chosen not to have personal contact with his/her child for an extended period prior to the application being submitted.

Parents

If you are a foreign national with a child living in the Faroe Islands, you qualify for a residence permit if:

• you are over 60 at the time the application is submitted,
• your relationship to the child can be documented and
• the child living in the Faroe Islands is a citizen of Denmark or another Nordic country or is a refugee

In order to qualify for a residence permit, your child must sign a declaration that he/she assumes responsibility for supporting you financially.

The child living in the Faroe Islands must also:

• be able to support his/her parent and
• have adequate housing.

Other family member

In certain special circumstances, you may qualify for a residence permit if you have a close relationship with a person living in the Faroe Islands.

Such relationships include:

• a child being adopted as part of a family adoption,
• a foster child
• esidence with close relations
• parent with a child living in the Faroe Islands who is not a citizen of Denmark or another Nordic country or a refugee

The Immigration Service will make its decision on a case-by-case evaluation. In order to qualify, your personal bond with the person living in the Faroe Islands must go beyond the family relationship itself.

In order to qualify for a residence permit, your child must sign a declaration that he/she assumes responsibility for supporting you financially.

The child living in the Faroe Islands must also:

• be able to support his/her parent and
• have adequate housing

You may qualify for a Faroese residence permit if you:

• have previously held Danish citizenship (and have not be stripped of it) or
• are of Danish/Faroese descent

Apply using form FO/SG2. More information about how to apply is available below.

Fill in the application

You can apply for a residence permit on the grounds of family reunification, as a former Danish citizen or as a person of Danish/Faroese descent, by filling in and submitting an application form.

You can choose between 4 different application forms depending on the ground of your application. You can fill in the application form in Word format on your computer before printing it out. The application form is also available as a PDF file that can be printed out and filled in by hand.

Form you need to use, if you want to apply for family reunification for spouses

Form you need to use, if you want to apply for family reunification for children

Form you need to use, if you want to apply for family reunification as another family member

Form you need to use, if you want to apply for residence permit on the grounds of previous Danish citizenship or Greenlandic/Danish descent

Printed versions of the application packets are available at the Danish embassy or consulate general in your country or from the Faroese police.

Enclose documentation

It is vital to the processing of your application that you include the correct documents.

The application packet contains a thorough description of how to apply, as well as a list of the documents you need to submit.

Normally, you must have obtained a residence permit before entering the Faroe Islands. You can submit your application in your country. In some cases, you may be allowed to submit your application in the Faroe Islands, but this depends on your grounds for being there.

If you already hold another type of residence permit in the Faroe Islands, have a valid visa or are not required to hold a visa, you can normally submit an application for a residence permit in the Faroe Islands.

If you have procedural residence, that is, the right to stay in the Faroe Islands even though you have not been granted a residence permit, you cannot submit an application for a residence permit in the Faroe Islands.

However, in certain situations, you may be permitted to submit your application in the Faroe Islands, even though you are not there legally.

Such would be the case if travelling to your country of origin to apply for a residence permit would be a significant burden on you, your spouse/partner in the Faroe Islands and any children living in the Faroe Islands. A decision in such cases will take into account the likelihood that your application would be approved.

The Danish Immigration Service is responsible for deciding whether applications submitted in the Faroe Islands can be accepted for processing.

If you submit your application in your country of origin

You can submit your application at a Danish embassy or consulate general in your country of origin. When you have completed and submitted your application, it will be forwarded to the Immigration Service in Denmark for processing.

If you have resided permanently in another country for longer than three months, you can also submit your application at a Danish embassy or consulate general in that country. If there is no Danish embassy or consulate general in your country of origin or residence, you may submit your application in another country. You can find additional information about Danish embassies and consulates on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

If you submit your application in DenmarkAn application for a Faroese residence permit can be submitted in Denmark, if you are staying in the country legally.

You can submit the application at the Danish Immigration Service. If you live outside the Copenhagen Police District and the Copenhagen Vestegn Police District, you can submit the application at the police station in your area of residence. The police will then hand over the application to the Immigration Service.

If you submit your application in the Faroe Islands

Normally, you must have obtained a residence permit before entering the Faroe Islands. If you submit your application after entering the Faroe Islands, the Immigration Service may reject your application. This means that you will have to return to your country of origin or residence and submit a new application.

In some cases, you may be able to submit your application in the Faroe Islands. The Immigration Service decides whether or not it will accept your application for processing. If your application is accepted, you may stay in the country during the processing. If the Immigration Service rejects your application, you can appeal the decision to the Ministry of Immigration and Integration.

If you submit your application for family reunification in the Faroe Islands and the Immigration Service accepts your application for processing, you may be granted procedural residence while you wait for a ruling. Procedural residence means that you are allowed to stay temporarily in the Faroe Islands while awaiting a decision about whether you can be granted a residence permit.

If you wish to travel abroad during this period, you will normally need to apply for a re-entry permit. Without a re-entry permit, you may not be allowed back into the Faroe Islands.

While you have procedural residence, you are not allowed to work, even if it is voluntary/unpaid work. If you work illegally, you risk fine or imprisonment, as does your employer. You also risk expulsion and a temporary re-entry ban, that is, you will not be allowed to enter the Faroe Islands for a certain period of time. If you hold procedural residence, you have only a limited right to medical assistance. If you require acute medical assistance or hospital care, you will be required to contact local authorities first.

Applications submitted in the Faroe Islands should be handed in at a police station (Chief Constable).