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For example, if a son was born to you one day before you became a Portugese citizen, he not be liable to military service: he was not born of Portuguese parents. If he were born two days later--the day after you receive your citizenship papers--he will be liable as he will have been born of Portuguese parents.
Luckily--again, no doubt, harking back to the Roman practice where service to the state could be in cash or kind--Portuguese law offers a person liable to military service the option of making a payment in lieu of performing the service. At the moment the "tax" is in the region of $US2,000.
Dual nationality
If you become a Portuguese national, Portugal does not require you to renounce your current national status.
Not all other countries take the same view: of the countries mentioned in this report, the United States does not recognise dual citizenship. Any person who becomes a US citizen must give up his other national status--and any US citizen who gains another citizenship must give up his US passport.
New Zealand, Britain, and Canada are not disturbed by their citizens also being citizens of another country.
Australia is a special case. While the US simply refuses to allow dual nationality, for an Australian it depends on how that second nationality was acquired. (A person becoming Australian does not have to give up his other passport.)
An Australian who actively seeks another citizenship must turn in his Australian passport. If that nationality is a secon- dary consequence of some other action--marriage, say, to a Malaysian, which automatically gives Malaysian citizenship--then the Australian is not "actively" seeking another national status. But if an Australian were to seek Portuguese nationality via the purchase of a property in Portugal, he would be deemed an "active seeker" of another national status (after all, an investment in Portugal does not automatically give you residency or citizenship --you must subsequently actively apply for those two rights) and would have to relinquish his Australian passport on receipt of Portuguese citizenship.
If you are a citizen of a country that requires you to give up your current national status on acquiring another citizenship, yet you still wish to have the option of a second nationality,
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