Meijers Committee standing committee of experts on international immigration, refugee and criminal law during the first 10 years after acquisition of that nationality. The Conseil Constitutionnel held in 1996 that born and naturalised French nationals have equal rights, but that different treatment of naturalised French was justified considering its limitation in time and the extreme seriousness of the acts committed. Without further reasoning, it stated that the proposal did not violate Article 8 ECHR.50 In 2006, the ten years period was extended to 15 years.51 In 2010, a Bill proposed by President Sarkozy allowing the withdrawal of the French nationality of each person of foreign origin (“toute personne d’origine étrangère”) who killed a police officer or another public official was rejected in the Senate. In January 2015, the Conseil Constitutionnel confirmed its 1996 position on the constitutionality of the rule in the Code Civil but added that a further extension of the 15 years term would violate the constitution.52 Shortly after the November 2015 attacks on the Bataclan, President Hollande proposed to amend the constitution and the Code Civil to enable the deprivation of nationality of born French citizens with a second nationality.53 This proposal received a positive advice from the Conseil d’Etat which considered inter alia that the proposal did not violate the equality principle. The Conseil d’Etat argued that dual nationals could not be compared to single nationals because the latter would become stateless if they were deprived of their French nationality. Also, the proposal would not result in differential treatment of born and naturalised French citizens as the latter could already be deprived of their nationality in case of a conviction for terrorist acts. The Conseil d’Etat found that the proposed legislation could result in the loss of EU citizenship or constitute an interference with the right to respect for private life protected by Article 8 ECHR and could therefore be subject to a proportionality assessment by the CJEU or the ECtHR. However, the Conseil d’Etat believed that the legislation would be considered proportionate given the very serious nature of the crimes that would lead to citizenship deprivation. The Conseil d’Etat did advise the legislator to adapt the proposal to the effect that only the most serious criminal acts would make the perpetrators liable to losing their French citizenship.54 The proposal triggered a strong debate between and within political parties and in the media.55 The Minister of Justice, Christiane Taubira, herself of immigrant origin, stepped down after the publication of a book in which she criticized the proposed amendments.56 Emmanuel Macron, at the time Minister of Economic Affairs, also openly criticized the proposal. The Assemblée Nationale and the Senate both amended the proposal and adopted different versions with a simple majority. The proposal was withdrawn in March 2016 after it failed to 50 Decision no. 96-377 of 16 July 1996. Article 21 of Loi no. 2006-64 of 23 January 2006. 52 Décision n° 2014-439 QPC du 23 janvier 2015. For a critical comment on this decision in English see F.-X. Millet, ‘Full-fledged citizens vs. citizens on probation in France. On the Conseil constitutionnel judgment relating to deprivation of nationality’, SIDIblog, 23 February 2016. 53 Proposal no. 3381 of 23 December 2015 54 Advice no. N° 390866 of 11 December 2015. 55 P. Weil and J. Lepoutre, Refusons l'extension de la déchéance de la nationalité!, Le Monde, 3 December 2015; R. Badinter, La déchéance de la nationalité, Le Monde, 5 February 2016. 56 Ch. Taubira (2016) Murmures à la jeunesse, Paris: Philippe Rey. 51 10