Will my baby get a HK passport?

L

Luckycrane

New member
I'm Canadian and my husband has HK permanent residency (but was born in the UK and lives in the UK). We are giving birth to our son in Hong Kong in January 2013. Will our newborn be entitled to right of abode in HK? Will he have a HK passport?

Can anyone share their experience?
 
The short answer is this - "nationality" here (and hence right of abode/right to have HK passport etc) is based on ethnicity. If either of you can prove that you have Chinese blood (even if the baby is only 1/4 or 1/8 Chinese, maybe even less), then they are eligible. If not, then they are not.

My kids are eligible since their Dad is ethnically Chinese. He was born in Hong Kong and has renounced his Chinese nationality so he has a permanent ID but the same kind as an expat would have. He is not eligible for HK passport, but our kids are because they were born with it and they haven't renounced it. I haven't gotten them a HK passport though because I don't see the point in them having a different passport to us at this stage.
 
Thx nicolejoy. We do not intend to live in HK and will leave for UK soon after our son is born, does this affect his eligibility?
 
you didn't answer whether or not one of you is ethnically chinese.

place of residence doesn't usually affect a person's nationality. ie) i've got a canadian passport. i was born there, but have lived almost 1/2 my life in hk. i have a uk passport. i've never even visited there. i have it because my father was born there and i was eligible through descent. i do not have a hk passport, even though i've lived here for almost 18 years. i'm not ethnically chinese. for me to get a HKSAR passport, i would have to give up both my canadian & uk passports, naturalise as a chinese citizen and then apply. HOWEVER, my two kids have canadian passports through descent (they were born in hk). they do not have uk passports because i got mine through descent. if they had been born in the uk, then they would have had uk passports. they ARE eligible for hksar passports because their father is hk chinese.
 
Thnx Carang.
We are both ethnically Chinese, but I don't hold a HK ID card just my husband and he was born in the UK. The main question is that if we go to HK and have my baby born in HK will he have Right of abode established on his Birth certificate? We live in the UK and intend to come back.

Can someone shed some light on this, very confused, we don't want to end up giving birth in HK and to notice our baby are not eligible for Right of Abode in HK.

Thanks
 
That is tricky. I am ethnically Chinese, though born in Canada (thus hold a Canadian passport) and hold a hKID and have lived here for nearly 30yrs...whole family is Chinese and live here...I am NOT eligible for hK passport unless I give up my Canadian one. My kids all have canadian and HK passports because my husband is Chinese and born in hong kong.
 
Talk to immig. They will be the only ones who can tell you for sure.

Make sure you lay everything out including your ethnicity.

Sent from my GT-I8150 using GeoClicks Mobile
 
i think you will get it. a friend was at immigration a few months ago. her daughter was born here (she is Eurasian like her mother), and the grandmother is Singaporean Chinese. The immigration officer saw the child who is now 2 and told the mother to apply for her. She did and got the child an SAR passport.
 
lesliefu said:
That is tricky. I am ethnically Chinese, though born in Canada (thus hold a Canadian passport) and hold a hKID and have lived here for nearly 30yrs...whole family is Chinese and live here...I am NOT eligible for hK passport unless I give up my Canadian one. My kids all have canadian and HK passports because my husband is Chinese and born in hong kong.
Click to expand...

From what I understand, if you have your HK "nationality" first, you can hold both passports, but if you want to "reclaim" it, you have to renounce your 2nd nationality. For example, if my husband had never renounced his Chinese nationality, he could hold both HK and Australian passport with no problems, since Australia allows dual nationality. However, since he renounced his Chinese nationality, to reclaim it he'd have to renounce his Australian nationality (which he doesn't want to do). Children who are born here don't face those issues since their first nationality is Chinese, so there is no conflict. It's only an issue for people born elsewhere (or those who have renounced and wish to reclaim citizenship).
 
Oh and LuckyCrane - to make the process easier, try to find some documentation that lists your ethnicity on it, and bring that along to the birth cert registration. Also before you accept it, make sure that the birth cert says "established" down the bottom.

Also, the process is smoother if you look Chinese and talk to them in Chinese - sometimes they don't even bother asking for "proof" of ethnicity in that situation. That happened when my husband applied for my eldest daughter's birth cert - he didn't bring any proof and wasn't hoping for her to have right of abode, but since he was obviously Chinese, he was told that we didn't have a choice, they HAVE to have right of abode. When I went to get my 2nd daughter's birth cert, I'm white and talked to them in English and I had to really fight them to get her right of abode since I didn't have the proper documentation (with exactly the same documents that we brought first time around). They eventually gave her right of abode, based on my 1st daughter's birth cert.
 
As Nicole mentioned, you or your husband need to bring proof that you are of Chinese descent when you go register your babies birth. In our case it was my mom's HKID of 40 years ago on which it states she is Chinese. It can be anything. If you bring something from one of your parents, also bring proof of your relationship with your parents (eg your birth certificate). They won't give your bb HK permanent residency based on looking Chinese and speaking Chinese.
 
They gave my daughter permanent residency based on my hubby "looking" and speaking Chinese, being born in HK and having a Chinese name - no "proof" other than that, and my hubby has renounced his Chinese nationality so does not have a 3 star permanent ID card. Nothing "said" he was Chinese. I do think it's best to bring proof, but they don't always want it. It probably depends on who you get on the day.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top