Judgment of the District Court of The Hague dated February 11, 2021

Petitioners hold both Vietnamese and Dutch nationality. They recently had a daughter, who is, therefore, also Vietnamese. When they tried to apply for a Vietnamese passport for their daughter, the Vietnamese embassy refused, stating that the daughter did not have a Vietnamese name.

Vietnam has strict rules regarding naming conventions. Article 26 of the Vietnamese Code of Civil Rights states the following:

“3. The naming is restricted in case it violates lawful rights and interests of other people and contravenes basic principles of civil law prescribed in Article 3 of this Code. The name of each Vietnamese citizen must be in Vietnamese or other ethnic minority languages of Vietnam and not include any figure or any symbol other than a letter.”

Given this provision in the Vietnamese Civil Code, petitioners believe that the refusal by the Vietnamese embassy constitutes a disguised restriction on naming. In Vietnam, it is not possible to give a child a Western name at birth. However, it seems that Western names are tolerated for children born in the Netherlands. Nonetheless, Vietnamese authorities require that a child be given a Vietnamese name to qualify for a Vietnamese birth certificate. Without a Vietnamese birth certificate, parents cannot apply for a passport for the child. Petitioners wish to give their daughter a second Vietnamese first name. They believe it is important for their daughter to have a “connection” with her partly Vietnamese heritage through her first name.

The court, based on the facts and circumstances presented by petitioners, rules that there is a sufficiently weighty interest in the request for a change of the first name. The court grants the request. As a result, their daughter will have a second first name added.