Whether you emigrate from your home country, or you are on an assignment; if you give birth to a child, questions occur: How and where to get a birth certificate for my baby? What about the baby's nationality/passport?
In short: have it registered to the local authorities, when it is required but always register it to your home country's embassy as well!
Recently, I got an inquiry from a young client, who was born in South Africa. His Grandmother was a German citizen who emigrated to South Africa as a young woman. She married a german rooted husband and later she gave birth to some children. One of them later became this young man’s mother.
Would this young man be eligible to get the German citizenship by birth?
It depends…
In general, people on an assignment know that they will have to go to their embassy to register the birth of their baby and get a passport for their child. As most of the assginees want to return to their home country later.
But if you emigrated years ago and never planned to return to your home country, it might be different. May be, you do not feel the need to register your child in your home country's embassy. As you never thought of returning home.
But how about your children and later-on your grandchildren? If you register the birth of your child to your embassy, it may have the chance to choose, whether it wants just the nationality of the country it was born to, or if it wants to gain the nationality of the country, their parents or even grandparents were born.
No matter if you are on an assignment or you emigrated. Make sure that your children get registered in your home country's embassy.
As an example you may find information about the German birth register here:
https://www.service-bw.de/leistung/-/sbw/Geburt+im+Ausland++Aufnahme+in+das+deutsche+Geburtenregister+beantragen-1774-leistung-0
I am curious to read from you, how you make sure that your children get registered and a passport, when they were born abroad? Write me your email here: immigration@moves-consulting.com
Pps: the young man asked his family about their birth registrations and found that nobody thought of registering them to the German embassy as well. He has no chance to get the German citizenship by birth.
Read more: https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/de/newsroom/buergerservice-faq-kontakt/faq/-/606800?openAccordionId=item-606232-1-panel
Have a great week ahead!
yours sincerly
Kornelia Epping