Thai nationality law

Thai nationality law includes principles of both jus sanguinis and jus soli. Thailand's first Nationality Act was passed in 1913. The most recent law dates to 2008.

Persons born anywhere in the world to at least one parent with Thai citizenship themselves are entitled to Thai citizenship at birth.

The first Thai Nationality Act of 1913 and most subsequent acts have included the principle of jus soli, though at times with various restrictions. The 1952 Nationality Act rescinded the 1913 act's provisions for jus soli, in response to concerns over the integration of the children of Chinese immigrants, but unlimited jus soli was restored just four years later by the 1956 Nationality Act. In 1972, due to illegal immigration from Burma and concerns over communist insurgency in border areas, the Nationality Act was amended to require that both parents be legally resident and domiciled in Thailand for at least five years in order for their child to be granted Thai citizenship at birth, and revoked citizenship from many people who had it under the earlier act. This caused difficulties for members of hill tribes in border areas who were not registered in the 1956 census, since they had no way to prove that their parents were Thai as opposed to having entered the country as refugees.

Article 23 of the 2008 Nationality Act reversed the 1972 act, restoring citizenship to those who had it before, and allowing people born in Thailand before 1992 to apply for Thai citizenship anew. However, applicants have reported various difficulties in getting government officials to process their applications. Following the act's passage, one of the first people to gain citizenship under Article 23 was Fongchan Suksaneh, a child of American missionaries to the Mlabri people who was born in Chiang Mai Province. Children, neither of whose parents are citizens and at least one of whose parents is an illegal alien, remain not entitled to jus soli citizenship. Furthermore, someone who has Thai citizenship by sole virtue of jus soli may still lose Thai citizenship under various conditions of the 2008 act (such as living abroad) which do not apply to people who have Thai citizenship by virtue of jus sanguinis. In 2013, the Ministry of Interior proposed new immigration regulations, based on Section 7 of the 2008 Nationality Act, to declare children who did not gain Thai citizenship at birth as illegal immigrants and have them deported.

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