Country-wide policy
The Interpol Record Check and the Rulings About It
Most changes of migration status from inside Peru, and every naturalisation application, require a Ficha de Canje Internacional - a record check issued by Interpol's Lima office, valid for six months. Peru's competition authority twice declared it an illegal bureaucratic barrier, and a Lima court then suspended those rulings at the interior ministry's request. Migraciones has been asking for it again since June 2024. The practical lesson is that Peruvian procedure requirements can be removed and reinstated by bodies other than the one running the procedure.
Topics it changes
- Residency on passive income
- Residency as a retiree
- Residency through work
- Residency as a student
- Residency through investment
- Residency through marriage
- Becoming a citizen
What it requires
- A Ficha de Canje Internacional issued by the Interpol national central bureau in Lima, dated no more than six months before filing
- Required for changes of migration status made from inside Peru, and for naturalisation
- Not required of minors
- Not listed among the requirements for visa applications made from outside Peru, nor for the Mercosur route
- For naturalisation, a sworn health declaration is required again alongside it since 14 June 2024
At a glance
- Validity
- Issued within the previous 6 months
- Issuer
- OCN Interpol Lima, Policía Nacional del Perú
- Declared an illegal barrier
- By Indecopi, January 2023 and August 2023
Two Indecopi rulings: Resolución 0382-2022-SEL-INDECOPI, published 13 January 2023, and Resolución 0254-2023 as extended by 0370-2023, published 10 August 2023.
- Suspended by a court
- 30 January 2024, at the interior ministry's request
Resolución Cuatro of the Fifth Contentious-Administrative Chamber of the Superior Court of Justice of Lima, reproduced on Migraciones' naturalisation page.
- Required again from
- 14 June 2024
The date Migraciones itself gives on that page for resuming the requirement.
- Legal basis Migraciones relies on
- Article 26 of Decreto Legislativo 1350, as amended by Decreto Legislativo 1582
Article 26 of Decreto Legislativo 1350, as amended by Decreto Legislativo 1582 - the provision Migraciones cites against the Indecopi rulings.
- What did change
- The naturalisation fee, replaced at S/ 301.50 by the 2023 procedures schedule
The fee comes from the TUPA approved by Decreto Supremo 008-2023-IN, in force from 23 October 2023 and so later than the rulings, which is why it stands.
Why a requirement list here is a moving target
Indecopi, Peru's competition and intellectual property authority, has a bureaucratic-barriers function: it can rule that a requirement imposed by a public body is unlawful and order it disapplied. It used that power against several Migraciones requirements in 2022 and 2023. The interior ministry challenged the rulings in court and obtained an interim suspension. The result is that the same requirement has been mandatory, then not, then mandatory again, without the underlying migration law changing at all. Anyone working from a list more than a year old is working from the wrong list.
What the law says
«La presentación de la Ficha de Canje Internacional (Interpol) es exigible, toda vez que cuenta con base legal en el artículo 26 del DL 1350, modificado por el DL 1582.»Our translation - not official
The presentation of the International Exchange Form (Interpol) is enforceable, since it has a legal basis in article 26 of Legislative Decree 1350, as amended by Legislative Decree 1582.
Migraciones publishes the ruling against itself and, immediately underneath, its reason for continuing to ask. Both statements sit on the same page, which is unusual and worth reading in full before assembling a file.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«se declara barrera burocrática ilegal, el impedimento de tramitar el procedimiento de cambio de calidad migratoria permanente residente con intervención de apoderado; por lo que, en dicho procedimiento se admite intervención de apoderado.»Our translation - not official
the impediment to carrying out the procedure for change to permanent resident migration status through a representative is declared an illegal bureaucratic barrier; accordingly, that procedure admits the intervention of a representative.
A ruling from November 2024 that did stick. It contradicts the condition printed higher up the same page saying the procedure is personal - which is a good illustration of how these pages accumulate rather than get rewritten.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«Mediante **Resolución Cuatro**, del 30 de enero de 2024, emitida por la Quinta Sala Especializada en lo Contencioso Administrativo con Subespecialidad en Temas de Mercado de la Corte Superior de Justicia de Lima, **se concede una medida cautelar** dictada a favor del Ministerio del Interior, en el cual **se suspenden los efectos del extremo resolutivo quinto de la Resolución 254-2023/SEL-INDECOPI,** del 9 de junio de 2023, ampliada por la Resolución 0370-2023/SEL-INDECOPI, del 14 de julio de 2023, referido a la inaplicación de la exigencia de la Ficha de Canje Internacional (Interpol) y la exigencia de la Declaración Jurada de Estado de Salud, declaradas barreras burocráticas ilegales.»Our translation - not official
By Resolución Cuatro of 30 January 2024, issued by the Fifth Chamber for Contentious Administrative Matters with a subspecialism in market questions of the Superior Court of Justice of Lima, an injunction is granted in favour of the Ministry of the Interior suspending the effects of the fifth operative part of Resolución 254-2023/SEL-INDECOPI of 9 June 2023, extended by Resolución 0370-2023/SEL-INDECOPI of 14 July 2023, concerning the disapplication of the Ficha de Canje Internacional (Interpol) requirement and the sworn health declaration, both declared illegal bureaucratic barriers.
Granted by the Fifth Contentious-Administrative Chamber for Market Matters of the Lima Superior Court on 30 January 2024, in the interior ministry's favour, suspending the Indecopi rulings that had removed the Interpol check and the health declaration from the naturalisation file.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«De acuerdo con la [Resolución N° 0382-2022-SEL-INDECOPI](https://www.gob.pe/institucion/indecopi/normas-legales/5558799-0382-2022-sel-indecopi), publicada en el Diario Oficial El Peruano el 13 de enero de 2023, se declara barrera burocrática ilegal: la [Ficha de Canje Internaciona](https://www.gob.pe/7307-obtener-ficha-de-canje-internacional-interpol) [l](http:)(Interpol) en los trámites de nacionalización por naturalización, no resultando exigible desde el día siguiente de su publicación.»Our translation - not official
Under Resolución 0382-2022-SEL-INDECOPI, published in the official gazette on 13 January 2023, the Ficha de Canje Internacional (Interpol) is declared an illegal bureaucratic barrier in naturalisation proceedings, and is not demandable from the day after its publication.
The first of the two rulings, and the one that fixes the January 2023 date. Migraciones' own page carries it.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«a partir del 14 de junio de 2024, Migraciones solicita la presentación de los requisitos de Ficha de Canje Internacional - INTERPOL y la Declaración Jurada de Estado de Salud»Our translation - not official
from 14 June 2024, Migraciones requires the Ficha de Canje Internacional - INTERPOL and the sworn health declaration to be produced
About this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«se aprueba el nuevo TUPA de MIGRACIONES, que rige desde el 23.10.2023, el cual establece nuevo monto por derecho de tramitación en el procedimiento de obtención de la nacionalidad peruana por naturalización ( S/ 301.50 ), respecto del cual no recae un mandato de inaplicación, por lo que su pago resulta exigible.»Our translation - not official
the new TUPA of MIGRACIONES is approved, in force from 23.10.2023, setting a new processing fee for Peruvian naturalisation (S/ 301.50), on which no disapplication order falls, so its payment is demandable.
The distinction the whole episode turns on: the old fee was struck down, the new one was set afterwards and so was never covered by the ruling.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
Grants and adjudicates migration status and naturalisation, and publishes the procedure pages with fees, channels and decision times.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: Not the text of the law - its pages are the agency's restatement and routinely disagree with both the legislative decree and its regulation on tourist extensions and on family permit duration. It carries thresholds that exist nowhere else and therefore cannot be corroborated; treat those as claims by the agency. Its two pages on the same regional agreement give different nationality lists, so no single page is safe as the list.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
Practical notes
The Interpol check is obtained in Peru, so it cannot be prepared before arriving - which is one reason the visa route from abroad does not ask for it.
The criminal record certificate from your country of origin is a separate document and is required on both routes.
Where Migraciones publishes an Indecopi ruling in its favour and a condition contradicting it on the same page, we record both rather than choosing.
We have read Migraciones' own notices about these rulings and not the rulings themselves or the court order.