In 1994, the Greek state, lowering the mandate of the historic Greek socialist party ‘Pasok-Kinal’, approved a law by which The Helena Royal Family lost its nationality. The so-called ‘Venizelos Law’ eliminated Greek citizenship from all members of the royal family and established the conditions for their recovery. Now, almost two years after Constantine’s death, his five children – and Doña Sofía’s nephews – have started the procedures in the civil registry of Athens to recover their Hellenic nationality.
Last week, a dozen members of the Greek Royal House presented a joint application for the restoration of citizenship. According to information, Anna María would have refused to participate in the process. Some media even claim that, when the wife of the former Greek monarch was asked by the civil registry official, she responded with “I’m not interested.” The applicants are the five children of Constantine; Alexia (58 years old), Paul (56 years old), Nicholas (54 years old), Theodora (40 years old), Filipos (37 years old), as well as Paul’s five children — Maria-Olympia, Constantino-Alexios, Achileas-Andreas, Odysseas-Kimon, and Aristidis-Stavros—. Days later, the Greek Minister of State, Makis Voridis, explained during an interview on Greek television that “there would be no additional legislation” during the process of recovery of nationality by the descendants of the former monarch, and that the applicable legislative framework is that established by the 1994 law, that is: that the two applicants recognize the constitution of the Democratic Republic of Greece, accept the result of the 1974 referendum that put an end to the monarchy in the Greek country and renounce any type of pretensions to access public office or possession of a noble title.
«With deep emotion, after 30 years, we regain Greek citizenship. The 1994 law deprived us of our citizenship, making us stateless, with all that this implies in terms of individual rights and great emotional suffering,” the former royal family expressed this Monday in a statement after learning of the granting of the restitution of Hellenic citizenship by the Greek authorities.
It should be noted that Pablo’s male children are of age to perform mandatory military service so, if they are granted citizenship, they must comply with this requirement and enlist in the coming months in the Greek Armed Forces. Hours later, the request was signed by the Greek Minister of the Interior and, following the publication of the resolution in the Greek Official Gazette, descendants of Constantine can apply for a Greek identity card and passport.
The surname question
One of the most difficult issues has been the choice of surname; Greek law establishes that, once the procedures have begun, the two descendants of Constantine would have to choose a surname, but not a noble title since these are not recognized in the Greek Magna Carta. During a recent interview, Pablo assured that he already has a surname, ‘De Grèce’ (From Greece) and I didn’t see any reason to change it.; On Thursday at the civil registry, all applicants expressed their desire to maintain this nickname. However, although ‘De Grecia’ is the surname that appears on the Danish passport that all members of the Hellenic Royal House have, this option is the one that the Greeks like the least, who would prefer that they had kept the ‘Glücksburg’ name, of the Helena Royal House until the abolition of the monarchy in 1973. Finally, the surname that will appear in the documentation of Constantine’s heirs will be ‘De Grecia’.
Exile and loss of nationality
Constantine acceded to the throne after the death of his father, King Paul I of Greece in 1964 at only 23 years of age. However, after the coup d’état and the beginning of the colonels’ dictatorship in the sixties of the last century, he had to go into exile first to Rome and then to London. Despite having been in exile for several years, he officially ceased to be king of Greece as of June 1, 1973.
After the fall of the military junta in 1974, the Greek country called a referendum on the restoration of the monarchy, which obtained an overwhelming majority in favor of the establishment of a parliamentary republic. Constantine did not set foot in Greece again until 1981. -but only for a few hours- to attend the funeral of his mother, Queen Federica.
After losing his nationality in 1994 and exhausting all possible legal avenues, in 2002 Constantine got the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg to recognize that Tatoi and other properties belonged to the Greek Royal Family and forced the Greek State to pay him compensation of 13.2 million euros. As of 2013, he established his permanent residence in Greece, where he spent his last years until his death in January 2023. It should be noted that Constantine never regained his Greek citizenship and had maintained his Danish citizenship since 1983.
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