Court name: Constitutional Court of Austria (Verfassungsgerichtshof)
State: Austria
Date of decision:
Legal instruments: European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), European Union law
Key aspects: Acquisition of nationality, Burden of proof, Deprivation of nationality, Determination/confirmation of nationality, Respect for private and family life, Standard of proof, Voluntary renunciation of nationality
The applicant acquired Austrian nationality in 1995 and renounced her former Turkish nationality in 1996 as a condition for retaining the Austrian nationality. In 2018 the Austrian authorities declared that she has no longer been an Austrian national since 1997 as it appeared that she voluntarily re-acquired her Turkish nationality at that time, which is a ground for automatic loss of Austrian nationality. The Court set aside the determination of loss of Austrian nationality as it did not carry out a proportionality test on the basis of the Tjebbes judgment.