My new Portugal passport is one step towards justice

Mr Paredes and his family are direct descendants of Eliau Abraham Lopes, a rabbi who lived in Curaçao in the early 18th century, and his wife, Raquel Nunes da Fonseca.

The law that permitted Mr Paredes to obtain Portuguese nationality was passed in April 2013 and was designed to compensate for an historical injustice that began in 1497, when King Manuel I ordered the Jews of Portugal to be forcibly converted.

About 40 years later, the Inquisition began persecuting converted Jews for continuing to practise their ancestral religion in secret. Over the next three centuries, those Portuguese Jews who wished to escape persecution and practise their religion, openly escaped to such cities as Constantinople (Istanbul), Salonika and Amsterdam, turning them into flourishing centres of Sephardic culture.

Jews who are members of a Sephardic community outside Portugal and who can demonstrate a link to the country based on such criteria as family name and genealogical records are eligible for citizenship. Those interested may apply through the Jewish community in Oporto.