I am writing in reply to Tony Vincent's letter about newborn children being stateless [TBT #578, vol. 10, Oct. 18, 2007].
Sadly he has been misinformed. A child whose parents are permanent residents of the Estonian Republic, but stateless, can get Estonian citizenship if his or her parents apply for him or her to have it. This law (§13.4) has existed for the past eight years. Also an under-15-year-old child whose parent applies for Estonian citizenship can get it with his or her parent.
Perhaps this simple error came from [Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights] Mr. Hammarberg who, in his visit to Estonia, suggested automatically giving citizenship to newborn babies. This is slightly different from Estonia's current policy because parents may want their children to have Russian Federation citizenship, which is granted to all ex-Soviet-Union citizens.
