Restoring Lithuanian citizenship by descent: the basics

Every few months someone sends me the same message. A cousin in Chicago, a colleague's partner in Dublin, a friend of a friend in Sydney: "My grandfather was Lithuanian. Can I get a passport?" Often the answer is yes. Sometimes it is no, and the reason is a date the family never thought about.

This is a plain guide to how reinstating Lithuanian citizenship by descent works, based on the Law on Citizenship and the Migration Department's guidance as of August 2024. It is general information, not legal advice. For your own case, ask a Lithuanian embassy or a lawyer, because the details of each family history matter.

First, the words

People in the diaspora usually say "restoring" citizenship. The law itself distinguishes two things. Reinstatement (in Lithuanian, atkūrimas) is for people who held Lithuanian citizenship before 15 June 1940, and for their descendants. Restoration in the narrow legal sense is for someone who held citizenship of modern Lithuania and lost it. This guide is about the first: getting back, through an ancestor, the citizenship that the Soviet occupation of 1940 interrupted.

One more distinction before you start. If one of your parents was already a Lithuanian citizen when you were born, you may be a citizen by birth and need a different, simpler procedure. Check that first.

Who can reinstate citizenship

The Law on Citizenship gives an indefinite right to reinstate citizenship to:

• people who held citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania before 15 June 1940, the day Soviet troops entered the country; and
• their descendants, which the law defines as children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Where you live does not matter. A great-grandchild in Buenos Aires has the same right as one in Kaunas. Citizenship can be reinstated only once.

The key question is therefore not "was my ancestor Lithuanian?" but "did my ancestor hold citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania before 15 June 1940?". That is a narrower test. Someone who left the Russian Empire in 1905 and never lived in independent Lithuania (1918 to 1940) usually never held its citizenship. Their descendants may have Lithuanian roots without having this right. People in that position sometimes have other routes, such as the certificate of Lithuanian descent, but those are separate procedures with different rules.

Can you keep your other citizenship?

This is where most families get confused. Lithuania's Constitution makes dual citizenship an exception, not the rule. Under the Law on Citizenship, a person reinstating citizenship normally has to give up any other citizenship, unless they fall into one of the listed exceptions. For descendants abroad, three exceptions matter most:

1. Exiles: people who held citizenship before 15 June 1940, or their descendants, who were forcibly expelled from Lithuania by the occupation regimes between 15 June 1940 and 11 March 1990, for example by deportation.
2. People who left before 11 March 1990: those who held citizenship before 15 June 1940, or their descendants, who left the territory of present-day Lithuania before 11 March 1990 to live permanently in another state, and whose permanent residence on 11 March 1990 was outside Lithuania. This does not cover people who moved from Lithuania to other parts of the Soviet Union after 15 June 1940.
3. Descendants of people in either group.

In practice this covers most families from the interwar and refugee waves described in our piece on the waves of Lithuanian emigration: the Brazilian descendant of a 1927 emigrant, the Canadian grandchild of a 1944 refugee. If you qualify under one of these, you may hold both passports.

It does not cover people who emigrated after 11 March 1990. A Lithuanian who moved to Ireland in 2006 and became Irish generally loses Lithuanian citizenship. Changing that requires amending Article 12 of the Constitution, which can only be done by referendum, and the amendment needs the support of more than half of all registered voters, not just of those who vote. Referendums on this were held on 12 May 2019 and again on 12 May 2024. On both occasions about three-quarters of those who voted said yes, and on both occasions the yes vote fell short of half of the whole electorate, so the amendment failed. As of this writing, the rules above are unchanged. Our background page on citizenship and the dual citizenship question explains how the debate developed.

A worked example

Take an illustrative case. Say a woman born in Cleveland in 1985 whose grandfather was born in a village near Kaunas in 1922, grew up there, fled west in 1944, lived in a DP camp in Germany and reached the United States in 1950.

• Did the grandfather hold Lithuanian citizenship before 15 June 1940? Almost certainly, as a child born and living in independent Lithuania to Lithuanian citizen parents. She needs a document showing it.
• Is she a descendant within three generations? Yes, a grandchild.
• Did he leave before 11 March 1990 and live permanently abroad on that date? Yes.

She can therefore apply to reinstate citizenship and, because she descends from a person who left before 1990, keep her American citizenship. Her file will need to prove each link: his citizenship, his departure, and the chain of births from him to her.

The documents you will usually need

The law lists the types of proof. In practice a typical file contains:

• Your identity document, usually a passport.
• Proof that your ancestor held Lithuanian citizenship before 15 June 1940. The law accepts, among others, an interwar Lithuanian internal or foreign passport; a Lithuanian passport issued by a Lithuanian diplomatic mission after 15 June 1940; documents showing service in the Lithuanian army or civil service; a birth certificate or other document that states Lithuanian citizenship directly; and personal certificates issued before 15 June 1940. If none of these exist, documents about study, work and life in Lithuania before that date can be offered instead.
• Proof of the family chain. Birth certificates for each generation from the ancestor to you, plus marriage certificates where a surname changed.
• Proof of name changes. Americanised spellings, married names and transliterations all need a paper trail.
• Proof of the dual citizenship ground, if you want to keep your other citizenship: for example records showing your ancestor emigrated before 11 March 1990 (immigration papers, naturalisation records, DP registration cards, ship manifests) or records of deportation.

If the family has no papers, the archives often do. The Lithuanian Central State Archives in Vilnius hold records from the interwar republic, including the application files for internal passports that every citizen over 17 had to carry, and can issue certified copies or certificates confirming citizenship before 1940. Records of deportation are held by the Lithuanian Special Archives. Both accept requests from abroad; check their current request forms and fees.

If the documents are still not enough, the law allows the facts to be established by a court in Lithuania. That is slower and usually needs a lawyer.

Some people first apply for a separate document confirming their right to reinstate citizenship, and only later file the application itself. It is optional, but it can help when you want the evidence checked before committing.

Translations and apostilles

Lithuanian officials work in Lithuanian, so:

• Foreign documents normally need a certified translation into Lithuanian.
• Documents issued in a country that belongs to the Hague Apostille Convention (the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and many others) normally need an apostille from the issuing country before they are accepted. Some public documents issued in other EU member states are exempt under EU rules.
• Order recent certified copies of birth and marriage certificates; old souvenir copies are often refused.

The order matters. Get the apostille on the original certificate first, then have the whole thing, apostille included, translated. Doing it the other way round is a common reason for a second trip.

Where and how to apply

The Migration Department under the Ministry of the Interior handles citizenship files. Since late 2021, applications are prepared online through MIGRIS, the Department's electronic system. After filling in the form and uploading copies, you book an appointment and appear in person with the originals: abroad at a Lithuanian embassy or consulate, or in Lithuania at a Migration Department office. A state or consular fee applies; check the current amount with the embassy or on the Migration Department's English site, because fees change.

The embassy forwards the file to Vilnius. The Department may ask for further documents. If the application is approved, you are informed of the decision, and only then can you apply for a Lithuanian passport or identity card, which is a separate application with its own fee.

How long it takes

There is no single answer. A clean file with an interwar passport and a short family chain can be decided in months. A file that relies on indirect evidence, has spelling problems across three generations or waits on archive searches can take well over a year. Budget time for each stage: ordering certificates, apostilles and translations, archive requests, the appointment itself and the Department's examination. Do not book a move to Vilnius on the strength of a planned decision date.

Step by step

1. Write down the family chain from the ancestor to you, with dates and places of birth.
2. Establish whether the ancestor lived in independent Lithuania between 1918 and 1940.
3. Work out the departure date and route, to see whether a dual citizenship exception applies.
4. Gather what the family holds: passports, letters, immigration and naturalisation papers.
5. Order missing records from the Lithuanian archives, and certified birth and marriage certificates at home.
6. Get apostilles, then certified translations.
7. Fill in the MIGRIS application, book the appointment, and take every original.
8. Keep copies of everything and note the file number for follow-up.

Common questions

My great-grandfather left in 1910. Can I apply?

Probably not on this basis. In 1910 Lithuania was part of the Russian Empire, so he could not have held citizenship of the Republic of Lithuania before 1940 unless he went back and lived there between the wars. Check the family story carefully before ordering any documents.

My parents left Lithuania in 2005 and I was born abroad. Does this apply to me?

Your situation depends on your parents' citizenship when you were born, not on the pre-1940 rules. If a parent was a Lithuanian citizen at your birth, you are likely a citizen by birth. Ask the embassy how to document it.

Do I have to speak Lithuanian?

No language test applies to reinstatement through an ancestor. Language and constitution exams apply to naturalisation, which is a different procedure.

Does reinstating citizenship affect my existing passport?

That depends partly on your other country's law, not only Lithuania's. Most countries with large Lithuanian diasporas allow dual citizenship, but check your own country's rules.

The citizenship circle collects the related pieces on documents and names. The most useful thing you can do this week costs nothing: ask the oldest relative you have where the family's old papers are, and photograph every page before anyone tidies them away.