A total of 433 people (182 men, 251 women) lost their Slovak passports over the course of two and half years due to the State Citizenship Act that automatically strips people of Slovak citizenship if they accept the citizenship of another state.
As the TASR newswire learned from Alena Koišová of the Interior Ministry's press department on Tuesday, January 22, most of these people lost their Slovak citizenship for accepting Czech citizenship (202 people), followed by German (71), Austrian (49), Hungarian (33), British (31), Dutch (12), American (11), French and Italian (both 4), Norwegian (3), Icelandic, Australian, Belgian, Canadian and Swiss (2 each) and, finally, Chinese, Ukrainian and Russian (1 each).
The Slovak Citizenship Act was passed by the first government of Robert Fico (2006-10) in response to the controversial Hungarian dual citizenship act, which gave an unprecedented opportunity for ethnic Hungarians native to and living in neighbouring countries like Slovakia and Romania to enjoy the benefits of Hungarian citizenship while living abroad. The Slovak legislation is being looked into by the Constitutional Court. This process was initiated by Gábor Gál (Most-Híd MP), according to whom the law is unconstitutional.
(Source: TASR)
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
