Kuwait opens a 10-year residency for people it stripped of citizenship, and widens who can stay abroad past six months

Kuwait has created a residency status for people whose Kuwaiti citizenship was withdrawn, allowing them to hold an ordinary residence permit for up to 10 years without paying the annual residency fee. The change comes in Ministerial Decision No. 1410 of 2026, issued by First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior Sheikh Fahad Yousef Saud Al-Sabah on 2 September and published in the official gazette Kuwait Al-Youm on Sunday 6 September. It takes effect from the date of publication. The same decision does something with a wider reach: it expands the list of foreign residents exempt from the six-month cap on time spent outside Kuwait.

Background

Since late 2024 Kuwait has run a large-scale review of naturalisations through a Supreme Committee to Investigate Kuwaiti Citizenship, revoking nationality under Article 13, clause 4 of Amiri Decree No. 15 of 1959. Interior Minister Sheikh Fahad Yousef put the cumulative figure at close to 50,000 in an interview with Al-Qabas in August 2025; monitoring groups counted more than 71,000 cases by mid-April 2026, around 4.6% of the citizen population. The National reports that nearly 29,000 of those affected are women who had been naturalised through marriage to Kuwaiti men, in some cases decades earlier. Those totals come from ministerial statements and rights organisations rather than a published official tally. People in that position lost not only nationality but any settled legal basis for staying in the country where many had lived their whole adult lives. The new Article 7 bis is the government’s answer to that gap.

What exactly changed

The decision amends Ministerial Decision No. 2249 of 2025, the executive regulations of the Foreigners’ Residence Law. It inserts a new Article 7 bis under which ordinary residency of up to 10 years may be granted to a person against whom a decree withdrawing Kuwaiti citizenship was issued, and to a person who had acquired citizenship by dependency and was named in that decree, provided they have returned to their original foreign nationality or obtained another one. Holders are exempt from the annual residency fee. Family residency for a spouse, children, father or mother costs KD 10 per person per year; other relatives pay KD 300 per year. Domestic workers sponsored by an Article 7 bis holder are charged at the rates that apply to domestic workers sponsored by Kuwaiti families.

The six-month rule, and who is now outside it

The second half of the decision matters to a much larger group. Under the residency regulations that took effect on 23 December 2025, a foreigner holding a Kuwaiti residence permit may not stay outside the country for more than six consecutive months without losing it, with domestic workers held to four months. Article 37 has now been amended so that the six-month limit does not apply to children of Kuwaiti women who did not themselves acquire Kuwaiti citizenship, to property owners, to investors holding residency under Law No. 116 of 2013 on foreign capital investment who meet conditions approved by the Council of Ministers, or to Article 7 bis holders. Other residents may still apply for permission to remain abroad longer, subject to conditions set by the General Department of Residency Affairs. The four-month cap for domestic workers stands.

Who it affects

Two quite different groups. The first is the people caught by the revocations, many of whom have had no clear status since. For someone in that position who has since taken up or recovered a foreign nationality, this is the first route to a long, fee-free residence permit and a cheap way to keep a spouse and children on family permits. The second group is broader: the expatriate who owns an apartment in Kuwait and spends long stretches with family overseas, or the licensed investor who divides the year between Kuwait and another base. Since December 2025 those absences carried a real risk to the permit. For the four listed categories, that risk is gone.

What this means in practice

The decision is in force, but the Ministry of Interior has not published an application route for Article 7 bis, so anyone who qualifies should watch the ministry’s own channels and the Sahel app rather than act on press coverage. If you are relying on the widened Article 37 exemption, the safe reading is that it covers the four named categories and nothing else. If your situation is close to one without clearly falling inside it, use the request-permission route through the General Department of Residency Affairs before you travel, not after. Our Kuwait country guide (/country-guides/kuwait) carries the standing entry and residence rules, and we will update it once the ministry sets out how Article 7 bis will be applied.