G. Citizenship (Article I.7)

7. Citizenship

There shall be a citizenship of Bosnia and Herzegovina, to be regulated by the Parliamentary Assembly, and a citizenship of each Entity, to be regulated by each Entity, provided that:

a) All citizens of either Entity are thereby citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

b) No person shall be deprived of Bosnia and Herzegovina or Entity citizenship arbitrarily or so as to leave him or her stateless. No person shall be deprived of Bosnia and Herzegovina or Entity citizenship on any ground such as sex, race, color, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or other status.

c) All persons who were citizens of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina immediately prior to the entry into force of this Constitution are citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The citizenship of persons who were naturalized after April 6, 1992 and before the entry into force of this Constitution will be regulated by the Parliamentary Assembly.

d) Citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina may hold the citizenship of another state, provided that there is a bilateral agreement, approved by the Parliamentary Assembly in accordance with Article IV(4) (d), between Bosnia and Herzegovina and that state governing this matter. Persons with dual citizenship may vote in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Entities only if Bosnia and Herzegovina is their country of residence.

The basic constitutional-legal determiners of the citizenship provisions reflect an ambivalent position of the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina when it comes to their loyalty to the state. Except for citizenship – “being a citizen” of Bosnia and Herzegovina (citizenship of Bosnia and Herzegovina) – the entity citizenship (citizenship of each Entity) has been recognised by the BiH Constitution. All citizens of either Entity are thereby citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina.³⁸⁸

Unlike Article 15 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, none of the other conventions that are referred to in Annex 1 to the BiH Constitution or in Annex 6 to the GFAP guarantee any “right to citizenship” as such. The prohibition of revocation of citizenship for deportation purposes was intentionally left out of Additional Protocol No. 4 to the ECHR.³⁸⁹ According to the opinion of the Human Rights Chamber, such a ban does arise from the context of the prohibition of abuse of rights under Article 17 of the ECHR. The Human Rights Chamber established that if the contracting parties would be allowed to revoke citizenship only for the purpose of subsequently deporting the concerned person, the prohibition of deportation would be just a fine word on a piece of paper. A measure whose clear and only aim is to evade the prohibition has the same meaning as a direct violation of prohibition.³⁹⁰ However, if a person submits an application for citizenship, it does not mean that the competent state bodies are not authorised to conduct the deportation procedure.³⁹¹ The citizenship related disputes, as constitutional issues, fall within the exclusive competence of the Constitutional Court.³⁹²

Article I.7 of the BiH Constitution should be interpreted in the context of special rights guaranteed under the Additional Protocols to the ECHR.³⁹³