How far is BiH from dual citizenship with Germany?

(Patria) - The House of Representatives of the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH adopted an initiative according to which the Ministry of Civil Affairs of BiH should initiate the procedure for concluding an agreement on dual citizenship between BiH and Germany. However, even if this procedure were to be initiated immediately, it could take years for this agreement to be ratified.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina told Nezavisne yesterday that they have not yet received the decision of the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH, and that it is too early to talk about the steps that will be taken.

"We have a process of concluding agreements ahead of us in the manner prescribed by the Law on the Procedure for Concluding and Implementing International Agreements. In any case, this process takes a long time," the Ministry of Civil Affairs of BiH told us.

It is also interesting that this initiative did not receive an entity majority in July, nor was an agreement reached during the harmonization before the Collegium of the House of Representatives. However, it was eventually adopted, and the fact is that Republika Srpska is against this agreement, so the procedure should be expected to be slower.

As we unofficially learn, Bosnia and Herzegovina has previously tried on several occasions to agree with Germany on signing a dual citizenship agreement, but Germany has never been interested in it.

More precisely, it was not legally possible in Germany for someone seeking German citizenship to also have citizenship of another country, but recent changes to the law have made this possible.

Nevertheless, even today, it is not uncommon for BiH citizens to have both citizenships, which is practically illegal from Germany's perspective, and also from BiH's perspective (because there is no signed agreement), although this has never been questioned.

When it comes to the procedure itself, the decision to initiate this procedure on its own initiative or at the proposal of the Council of Ministers of BiH is made by the Presidency of BiH.

Then, a commission is formed to conduct negotiations.

Depending on the case, these negotiations can last from several months to several years, but when they are completed, the delegation submits a report on the negotiations to the Presidency of BiH and the Council of Ministers of BiH, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of BiH submits the text of the international agreement.

Further procedure involves determining the signatory of the agreement, and the BiH delegation, after signing it, sends the agreement to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which submits it in draft form to the Council of Ministers of BiH.

After that, the Council of Ministers of BiH determines the proposal of the international agreement and submits it to the Presidency of BiH, which finally sends the agreement to the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH for prior consent.

Upon receiving the consent of the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH, the international agreement is ratified by the Presidency of BiH, and the decision on ratification is signed by the Chairperson of the Presidency of BiH.

The justification for the initiative to conclude an agreement on dual citizenship between BiH and Germany states that a new Citizenship Law has entered into force in Germany, which allows for the acquisition of a German passport and the possession of dual citizenship.

"In the event of the conclusion of the relevant bilateral agreement, citizens of BiH who have had to renounce their BiH citizenship until now would be on an equal footing with others, because the legislation of the Federal Republic of Germany did not allow dual citizenship until now. This enables more than 30,000 former citizens of BiH to regain their BiH citizenship," it is stated, among other things, in the text of the adopted initiative.