Afghan nationality law is regulated by the Constitution of Afghanistan, as amended; the Citizenship Law of the Afghanistan and its revisions; the Afghan Civil Code; and various international agreements to which the country is a signatory. These laws determine who is, or is eligible to be, an Afghan national. Since the Taliban took control of the country in 2021, it is unclear what laws are in place. An announced revision to the constitution was planned for 2022. Due to concerns over human rights violations, the Taliban regime has received no international recognition.
Afghan nationality is typically obtained under the principal of jus sanguinis, i.e., by birth to parents with Afghan nationality. It can be granted to persons with an affiliation to the country, or to a permanent resident who has lived in the country for a given period of time through naturalization. The legal means to acquire nationality, formal legal membership in a nation, differ from the domestic relationship of rights and obligations between a national and the nation, known as citizenship. Nationality describes the relationship of an individual to the state under international law, whereas citizenship is the domestic relationship of an individual within the nation. Some countries use the terms nationality and citizenship as synonyms, despite their legal distinction and the fact that they are regulated by different governmental administrative bodies.
Acquiring Afghan nationality Nationality in Afghanistan is typically acquired by birth to an Afghan or later in life through naturalization.
By birth According to Abdullah Athayi, an attorney and the program coordinator of Foreign/Security Policies and Democratization for the Heinrich Böll Foundation, the Afghan law on nationality is based upon Sharia jurisprudence. Per Athayi, because of stipulations in the Afghan Civil Code, children who are not legitimate or whose parents were not married under Islamic law cannot obtain either citizenship or nationality. International interpretation varies and other nations have noted that there is a conflict between provisions of the Civil Code and the nationality laws. Those who can acquire nationality by birth include:
Children born anywhere to at least one parent who is an Afghan national; Children born in Afghanistan to foreign parents without diplomatic immunity and who permanently live in Afghanistan acquire Afghan nationality upon reaching the age of majority unless they opt for foreign nationality within six months of becoming eighteen; Foundlings whose parents are unknown; or Children whose parents are proven to be stateless or who have unknown nationality.
By naturalization Foreigners and stateless persons may apply for Afghan nationality by naturalization. General provisions are that applicants are of legal majority, have no criminal history in Afghanistan, and have resided within the country for a minimum of five years. Persons who appear to have the potential to harm national security can be rejected. There are no provisions in the nationality law for adoptees to acquire nationality through their adoptive parents.
Loss of nationality Afghans are allowed to renounce their nationality, provided that they comply with the application process and confirm that they have no outstanding civic, financial, or penal obligations to the government of Afghanistan or private corporations or persons. Their identity card must be surrendered at the time of application. Renunciation of nationality does not effect the nationality of a spouse or children under Afghan law. Though Article 4 of the 2004 Constitution declares that no Afghan can be deprived of their nationality, denaturalization can occur under the nationality law for persons who commit treasonous acts or other actions that pose a threat to the national security of Afghanistan. Persons who have previously lost nationality may apply for repatriation, which may be granted at the discretion of the Commission charged with review for the Ministry of Justice and the President of Afghanistan.
Dual nationality Since 2001, Afghans have been allowed to hold dual nationality, though this is in conflict with the terms of the nationality law. The president is barred under the constitution of 2004 from having dual nationality and the legislature has the authority to determine if legislators or cabinet ministers can serve if they hold other nationality.
History Nationalism is an ideology that is founded on a belief of a political authority for society, which has as its two main goals, union of the polity and freedom from foreign authority. In that context, the area now known as Afghanistan has existed as a nation since the birth in approximately 1500 BC of the Indo-Persian Achaemenid Empire which included Ariana, the first name applied to Afghanistan. From at least the tenth century BC, governance of tribal people in the form of jirgas, public assemblies, were held to encourage participation in self-rule, though the area was constantly in conflict with foreign powers who asserted efforts to take over the state. Tribal society was organized in an egalitarian system, typically without hereditary rule. To gain support for actions, leaders had to build consensus and alliances, as hierarchy, ranks, and titles were objectionable. The hierarchical structures of the Indo-Persian, Turko-Persian, and Turko-Mongolian conquerors ruled the major population and trade centers and left the less strategic areas to fend for themselves. Conquest in this period was characterized by gaining possession of a territory and transforming the conqueror into the legitimate authority. Legitimating rule typically meant that a religious proclamation was followed by issuance of currency and the obligation of the ruler to protect the subjects from other invaders in exchange for their obedience and payment of taxes. The inhabitants under rule were seen as economic assets for the ruler, thus the lands that they occupied and the political activism of the subjects were not necessarily critical. The army under a ruler's command was important to his authority, as lack of military support meant the loss of a ruler's power.
From the sixth century BC, Ariana was a satrapy, or province, of the Achaemenid Empire. In the fourth century BC it was annexed by Alexander the Great, and within a hundred years became a province of the Maurya Empire, under the governance of Ashoka. The spread of Buddhism continued with the founding of the Kushan Empire, which arose in 50 AD in the area of Bagram. Arabs invaded the territory, which became known as part of Khorasan, in the seventh century AD and had firmly implanted Islam by the tenth century. The Ghaznavid Empire, the first Islamic state in the territory, was centered in Ghazni and established in 977. It began to decline with the rise of the Ghurid Empire around 1150 and was conquered by them in 1186. The Ghurids ruled until 1217, when they were defeated by the Khwarazmian Empire, which in turn was brought down by the military superiority of the Mongols under the leadership of Genghis Khan around 1219. When Khan died in 1227, his empire was split among his descendants with what is now Afghanistan being incorporated into the Chagatai (or Jagatai) Khanate. Though the Mongols left troops in the region, they soon lost interest in it and the Il Khanate assigned the rule to a vassal state of Tajik people known as the Karts, who became dominant in Herat in the mid-thirteenth century. By the end of the thirteenth century, the Jagatai and Il Khanates were in conflict and the territory experienced growth under powerful warlords who carved out local domains from the former empire. In 1361, Timur began consolidating his power and eventually founded the Timurid Empire, taking the leadership of the Jagatai Khanate and its territory. During the Timurid Renaissance which lasted through 1506, conflict receded and cultural development and the arts flourished.
At the beginning of the sixteenth century, three empires emerged in Afghanistan. The western territory was ruled by the Safavid dynasty of the Khanate of Bukhara from 1501 to 1786. The eastern territory, with its capital in Kabul was under the control of the Mughal Empire between 1526 and 1858, while the southern region was governed by the Shaybanid Empire between 1500 and 1598. The sixteenth through seventeenth centuries were marked by a period of building resistance to foreign rule. By the eighteenth century, the Ghilji Pashtuns who founded the Hotaki dynasty rebelled against the Safavid dynasty defeating them in Kandahar in 1709. The Abdali Pashtun tribes took Herat in 1716, and a combined force of Hotaki, Abdali, and Balochi forces attacked the Safavid capital at Isfahan in Persia in 1722 ending the rule of the Safavids. In response Persian troops from Khorasan recaptured the area in the 1730s. When the Persian leader, Nader Shah was killed in 1747, Afghanistan was effectively separated from Persia, establishing one of the commanders of the Afghan forces and a former bodyguard of Nader, Ahmad Kahn as the new shah of the Abdali tribes, who thereafter called themselves the Durrani.
Establishing Afghanistan (1747–1920) Ahmad Shah subsequently led nine invasions through the Indian subcontinent, establishing boundaries of his state stretching from the Amu Darya River in the north, southward to the Indian Ocean and from the Indus River in the east, westward to Khorasan. The majority of his armies were Pashtun people, and from the time of Ahmad Shah's rise, Pashtun identity was politically dominant, though he ruled a multi-ethnic population. At the end of the eighteenth century, Britain began extending its control in India stopping Afghan expansion. Britain, France, and Russia, each accelerated their plans of imperial conquest and in an effort to curb the expansion of their rivals, from 1809 Afghanistan became a buffer zone between the colonial powers. Internally, after a struggle between the Barakzai and Mohammadzai clans, the Durrani Empire collapsed in 1823 and the Emirate of Afghanistan was founded by Dost Mohammad Khan. Fearing an alliance between Russia and Afghanistan, the British involved themselves in affairs of the Afghan throne, which brought about the First Anglo-Afghan War. Exiling the legitimate ruler to India, the British installed a new shah who would lead under their direction. British advice to the shah led to a series of political errors that impacted both the social structure and economy, and in the unrest that followed, the British withdrew from the country in 1842.
In 1843, Dost Mohammad Khan returned and was reinstated to his rule with the promise that the British would refrain from further interference, if he refrained from expanding to India. Between 1845 and 1863, the Emirate was able to incorporate Herat, Kandahar, and Turkistan, unifying the territory, but the areas were indirectly ruled and administration was neither centralized or modernized. A five-year period of civil unrest followed Dost Mohammad Khan's death in 1863. During the same time frame, Britain and Russia made several agreements over their expansion spheres in Central Asia. Each of the rivals tried to gain favor in various parts of the territory, and tensions escalated into the Second Anglo-Afghan War in 1878. Two years later, the war ended and Abdul Rahman Khan was recognized by Britain as the new Afghan head of state. The terms that were agreed upon at the end of the conflict were that the Emirate would allow Britain to negotiate its matters of foreign affairs without involving itself in Afghanistan's internal affairs. In exchange, Britain would provide protection and assistance, in the form of money and weapons to prevent aggression or challenge to the rule of Abdul Rahman Khan.