Court name: Court of Justice of the European Union
Date of decision:

The authorities refused to examine the applications of Dutch nationals, with dual nationality of a non-EU country, for renewal of their Dutch passports. The decision was based on the fact that they had lost their Dutch nationality because they possessed a foreign nationality and had their principal residence for an uninterrupted period of 10 years outside the Netherlands and the EU. The CJEU found that Member States may lay down rules regulating the loss of their nationality and, as a result, the loss of EU citizenship, where the genuine link between the person and that State is durably interrupted. Nevertheless, the loss of nationality must respect the principle of proportionality, which requires an individual assessment of the consequences of that loss for the person from the point of view of EU law.

Court name: Administrative Court of Montenegro
State: Montenegro
Date of decision:

The applicant attempted to obtain Montenegrin nationality for himself and his two minor children through naturalisation. The requests were rejected, as the applicant did not fulfil all the naturalisation requirements. However, with regard to the children, the Court ruled that even though their parent's naturalisation failed, their entitlement to the Montenegrin nationality should be explored on the basis of acquisition at birth, as the children are otherwise stateless, and annulled the part of the administrative decision related to the children on the basis of insufficient reasoning. 

Court name: Council of State of the Netherlands (Raad van State)
Date of decision:

The case concerns a child born in the Netherlands to an undocumented mother of Chinese origin. The child is registered in the municipal records as having an "unknown" nationality. The mother attempts to register him as "stateless" to strengthen his claim to Dutch citizenship, but cannot meet the high standard of proof set by the municipality for registering statelessness. The Court sides with the municipality in this case, but implies that the legislator ought to establish a statelessness determination procedure in the Netherlands.