The Interior Ministry in Vienna has rejected the application for Austrian citizenship for 104-year-old South Tyrolean Hermine Orian.
She was in fact born Austrian in April 1919 because South Tyrol, although already occupied by the Italian army, would officially pass to Italy only a few months later, with the signing of the Saint Germain agreement.
As ANSA learns from the Austrian Foreign Ministry, "even if obviously the lady's desire from an emotional point of view is understandable, the law on citizenship provides a clear legal framework. The Ministry of the Interior, which is responsible for it, does not see any legal basis for granting citizenship".
In Vienna, in recent days, however, a favorable opinion was hypothesized for special merits, given that under fascism Orian taught German in clandestine schools, the so-called Katakombenschulen.
"I was born Austrian and I want to die Austrian": so Hermine Orian had expressed her wish.
The Tyrolean patriotic movement
Andreas Hofer Bund, which has long since taken up its cause, claimed that Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg was in favor of granting citizenship, but the idea had not been accepted by that of the Interior.
Hermine Aloisia Mair was born on 23 April 1919 in Cortaccia.
By marriage she became Mrs. Orian and then she the mother of two children.
Today she lives with
one of them in Scena, above Merano.
For about ten years, the great-grandmother has been pursuing the dream of returning to being Austrian.