dual citizenship

[Jay & Ping]

Personally I would use the US passport with a visa and lock the Chinese passport away until it's required for something a USA passport can not provide. I don't know what that could be, but I'd keep it like insurance for something like emergency surgery durring a visit to China. (I'm guessing here). Perhapse purchasing property in retirement, etc.

Matching entry/exit stamps on a single passport are probably important too.

[warpedbored]

She already has a US passport. We just need to get her a visa.

[Urkidding]

When your wife gets her USC, they take her Green Card Away.

 

 

 

read on...

 

 

 

Safety first on passports

 

 

 

Wu Zhong

 

 

December 13, 2004

 

 

 

Granting dual nationality to the Chinese diaspora may have devastating results Despite increasingly louder calls overseas that China recognise dual nationality by revising its immigration laws, it is unlikely if not impossible that Beijing will do so.

 

Those who hold dual nationality theoretically owe allegiance to more than one country at the same time - and thus can carry two or more passports.

 

The ability to carry dual citizenship is important to a relatively small but economically valuable class of migrants - those who can cross borders from their home countries to work overseas for long periods of time, with all the rights and privileges accorded to the citizens of their host countries.

 

At the moment, about 100 countries or regions recognise or tolerate dual citizenship in varying degrees. However, as globalisation spreads, more countries and regions are expected to follow suit.

 

For historical, cultural, political, ideological and practical concerns, China can hardly be expected to join the club, however - at least not until dual nationality becomes universally accepted by the international community. It is something that has been effectively banned, since at least 1949, when the communists seized power, even though there has been no legal restriction.

 

China did not legislate its first Law of Nationality until 1980 as the country began to open up cautiously. The law, which has never changed, stipulates that ``The People's Republic of China does not recognise dual nationality of a Chinese citizen.''

 

Thus Chinese citizens must give up their nationality if they seek allegiance to another flag. There has been little dispute over the law until recently.

 

China gradually began to allow its citizens to travel, study and migrate in the early 1980s. In the two decades since, most, if not all of those who left the mainland were more than willing to forsake their nationality to become citizens of other countries, preferably the United States or other Western countries. Few bothered to give any thought to whether their Chinese citizenship could be retained.

 

But times have changed. Business and job opportunities have exploded as China's burgeoning economy continues its headlong growth. Many Chinese have returned to work or invest, and still more plan to do so.

 

As a result, more and more overseas Chinese are urging Beijing to revise the law to recognise dual nationality.

 

In Canada, which has accepted more than 300,000 migrants from the mainland over the past two decades, an overseas Chinese organisation has concluded a study showing 92 per cent of mainland migrants want Beijing to allow them to be citizens of both countries.

 

Their main argument is that because Canada recognises dual nationality they have virtually retained Chinese citizenship and Beijing should not deprive them of it.

 

Not long ago, when senior Chinese officials visited New Zealand three local Chinese groups handed over petitions urging that Beijing recognise their dual nationality.

 

Needless to say, having Chinese citizenship back is in practice a great advantage that would allow them to travel to China more conveniently, and to work and run businesses in sectors forbidden to foreigners. Their children would have access to government-subsidised education.

 

But Beijing, which has nearly 1.3 billion people to take care of at home, needs to consider many other factors.

 

China is a country under communist dictatorship. And, in order to hold the nation together, Beijing needs to exercise ideological education and control. Patriotism is at the core of this ideology.

 

Under such circumstances, if Beijing were to accept dual nationality, a problem would arise: to which country should the double-passport holder owe allegiance?

 

There is no satisfactory solution. But an unsatisfactory answer would deeply shake people's faith in patriotism. Compared with the interests of returned overseas Chinese, perhaps in the tens of thousands, the unity and stability of the nation is far more important for Beijing.

 

Since the June 4 Tiananmen crackdown in 1989, Beijing has been exiling dissidents for good. Beijing might have had a bigger headache if many dissidents were dual nationals.

 

Beijing also must consider the impact of China's relations with countries which do not recognise dual nationality such as the United States, and particularly countries in Southeast Asia, home to about 20 million ethnic Chinese.

 

During the Cold War era, these Southeast Asian countries feared communist infiltration through Chinese living there, to the point where anti-Chinese riots periodically erupted.

 

To ease these tensions, Beijing adopted an explicit policy in late 1970s to encourage overseas Chinese in southeast Asia to become citizens of countries where they were living.

 

Beijing's recognition of dual nationality would thus be like a big stone thrown into a pool.

 

Southeast Asia could again become suspicious of China, fearing that the Middle Kingdom this time might want to use the ethnic Chinese to control their economies, sparking fresh anti-Chinese riots. China then would be obliged to protect its citizens or take them back, inevitably causing instability.

 

Beijing apparently is far from ready to take such risks.

[jim_julian]

The negatives postulated in the article seem to me to be unlikely to happen ... I mean, do Malaysia or Singapore need to be afraid of a fifth column of Chinese dual nationals taking over?

 

I got the impression that the writer was projecting a point of view rather than writing a balanced piece.

[LeeFisher3]

She already has a US passport. We just need to get her a visa.

You might check, but I believe a Chinese born USC is supposed to submit their Chinese passport when applying for a visa, the odds are they will void the Chinese passport at that time and return it.

[C4Racer]

She already has a US passport. We just need to get her a visa.

You might check, but I believe a Chinese born USC is supposed to submit their Chinese passport when applying for a visa, the odds are they will void the Chinese passport at that time and return it.

 

This is absolutely correct. We had a friend that just became a USC, got a visa to China and made the trip on her US passport. The Chinese consulate made her surrender her Chinese passport, they voided it and clipped the corners. She got it back, but it very evident that it is no longer a vaild passport.

[Urkidding]

She already has a US passport. We just need to get her a visa.

You might check, but I believe a Chinese born USC is supposed to submit their Chinese passport when applying for a visa, the odds are they will void the Chinese passport at that time and return it.

 

This is absolutely correct. We had a friend that just became a USC, got a visa to China and made the trip on her US passport. The Chinese consulate made her surrender her Chinese passport, they voided it and clipped the corners. She got it back, but it very evident that it is no longer a vaild passport.

 

Wife just got a VISA recently and they never asked for her China passport..

 

This has changed from the past.