Publication

At the moment, the discussion about dual citizenship is one of the most escalated question`s in our legal society. The Seimas of the Republic of Lithuania and the Lithuanian World Community held a three-day meeting from July 9 to 11. The main issues were a referendum regarding dual citizenship and its conditions, as well as the need to significantly lower the number of votes necessary to make a decision. The Seimas proposed to reduce the decision-making vote number from 1.25 million votes to 840 thousand votes, however, this proposal was vetoed by the President, as it raises doubts about compliance with the Constitution and therefore is questionable.

The Chair of the Lithuanian World Community Dalia Henke stated that a referendum is likely to take place in conjunction with the presidential election in the upcoming spring, however, the LWC’s position and proposal was to hold a referendum together with the elections one year later. Such proposal is fully understandable: in order to adopt the amendments to the Constitution, great attention, focus and unity of the Lithuanian society and Lithuanians all over the world are required.

Currently, dual citizenship is a rare exception and is only possible in the following cases:

• If a person has acquired the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania and the citizenship of another state at birth;
• If a person was exiled from the occupied Republic of Lithuania before 11 March 1990, or such person’s descendant(s);
• If a person  has left Lithuania before 11 March 1990, or such person’s descendant(s);
• If a person is married to a citizen of another state who has ipso facto acquired the citizenship of that state;
• If a person under 21 years of age has acquired the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania pursuant to Article 17(1) of the Law on Citizenship as a result of an adoption, provided that he or she was adopted by a citizen or citizens of the Republic of Lithuania before reaching 18 years of age;
• If a person under 21 years of age has acquired the citizenship of another state as a result of an adoption, provided that at the time of adoption he or she was a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania and was adopted by a citizen or citizens of another state before reaching 18 years of age;
• If a person has acquired the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania by way of exception while being a citizen of another state;
• If a person has retained or has restored the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania for his or her outstanding merits to the State of Lithuania;
• If a person has acquired the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania while having a refugee status in the Republic of Lithuania.

From the above-mentioned grounds for acquiring dual citizenship, we can conclude that the cases in which dual citizenship can be acquired are very specific and rare. Currently we are mostly facing situations where a person that has left Lithuania before 11 March 1990 wants to acquire dual citizenship.

The biggest problem in this situation is the confusing terms. The person must have left the Republic of Lithuania no earlier than 1918 and has to have lost the citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania before 1940. Forecasting additional conditions makes the acquisition of dual citizenship even more difficult, and often both the client and we are disappointed with the helplessness in this situation. However, we can rejoice and hope that a referendum will take place during the forthcoming presidential elections, that Lithuanians all over the world that don’t want to lose their national consciousness will unite and will unanimously vote for the legitimacy of dual citizenship, and that dual citizenship will no longer be an exception, but will be a natural person’s right to national consciousness.