3 star system PID.

[Hairball]

No, there is absolutely no requirement to hand in your BNO when you get an SAR Passport, In fact , you can renew your BNO for life. The Uk practices what is called universal citizenship, so even if for some reason you gave it up, you could always get it back. OTOH, China does not recognize your BNO in Hong Kong, but it is recognized in every other country on earth. I am of the opinion, one day BNO passports will become full UK citizenship. This has been slowly happening already, and if the UK every adopts the European constitution, then all bets are off.

In general you are correct, but the BNO is accepted as a travel document to enter Hong Kong as its holders will have ROA or RTL in HK.

The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region - Immigration Department

There are some cases where you can even get a Chinese visa on it if you aren't a Chinese citizen as well. It is only not recognized for Chinese citizens as a foreign nationality.

[packy_crusher]

In the past Canada did not allow dual citizenship, but since the 70s it's been allowed, and they do not care whether or not you renounce your old citizenship or whether it is still valid when you become Canadian.

The ones that may have lost it may have lost it due to some funny rules since they started looking at citizenship records more seriously.

Yeah, but there is talk about changing the rules in Canada thanks to the huge cost of getting all those Lebanese Canadians evacuated from lebanon a few years ago…..

[star-anise]

In the past Canada did not allow dual citizenship, but since the 70s it's been allowed, and they do not care whether or not you renounce your old citizenship or whether it is still valid when you become Canadian.

The ones that may have lost it may have lost it due to some funny rules since they started looking at citizenship records more seriously.

Yes, I suspect so. This is the same with Australia and most countries that recognise dual nationality.

I think I read the situation a bit better now from the following article:

Canada helps Malaysians break citizenship laws | AsianPacificPost.com | Chinese newspaper, Filipino newspaper, Philippines newspaper.

[Hairball]

Yeah, but there is talk about changing the rules in Canada thanks to the huge cost of getting all those Lebanese Canadians evacuated from lebanon a few years ago…..

It's probably just grandstanding at the moment, I doubt they'd try to restrict dual citizenship, maybe just not offer those kind of benefits as it may be a bad precedent. The current Conservative government is still very pro-immigration, a lot different from those Reform days.

[Elfin safety]

Many of my local friends travel on the BNO knowing that if there is every a problem during their travels, they would pretty much get no assistance front he Chinese embassy. .

The evidence is that you get pretty much no assistance from the British authorities. There was a well-publicized case of a BNO Chinese who was detained by Indian authorities on suspicion of a fake passport because they weren't familiar with the BNO, and the British High Commission in India even certified it was a fake because they weren't familiar with it either!

There is still a lot of ignorance about the BNO passport among immigration officials worldwide, with the potential for confusion and embarrassment. The fact is that the British consular staff worldwide are less likely to help, or be able to help, BNO passport holders. Most BNOs are Cantonese speakers who may have little or no English; British consular staff outside Hong Kong are unlikely to have Cantonese speakers; and it follows also that HK Chinese BNO holders are less likely to seek help from British consulates when traveling abroad. There is also the complication that Chinese consular staff may refuse to help HK Chinese traveling on BNO passports (although they are supposed to). My conclusion is it's probably better for HK Chinese to travel on a HKSAR passport. Also, in the albeit remote event of an al-qaeda terrorist kidnapping you probably don't want to be mistaken for a British citizen...

Anyway, I digress.