It is obligatory to register the birth of a child born in Albania with the Albanian authorities.

There is no obligation for the birth overseas of a British national to be registered with the British Embassy. However, there are the advantages in that a British form of birth certificate is then available and a record of the birth is afterwards held at the General Register Office in the United Kingdom.

Registration of births can be lodged at the British Embassy in Tirana for dispatch to the British Embassy in Rome.

The following services are chargeable in the British Embassy, Tirana under the Consular Fees Order 1999:

• Registering a birth in the Consular Register;
• Issuing a certified copy of an entry in the Consular Register of births.

Visit the Consular Fees page for payment details.

Before a birth registration can be made, evidence must be produced of the national status of the person whose birth is to be registered.  For this process only original documents are accepted.

To register a birth you will need to show:

• the child’s full overseas birth certificate naming both parents
• the British parent long birth certificate, or if parent is British and born outside the United Kingdom, documentary evidence of their claim to British nationality, eg Naturalisation or registration certificate
• the non-British parent birth certificate
• the parent marriage certificate and, if appropriate, evidence of the termination of any previous marriage of either parent
• copy of British parent passport plus copy of non British parent passport or ID card.

Please note:

• if both parents are British citizens, documentary evidence of citizenship of both must be produced
• where the father is not married to the child's mother, a Paternity/Maternity Declaration needs to be signed in front of a Consular officer, by both parents
• the Consular Birth Registration Form below in PDF should not be used if the child's parents are not married and the father is the only British parent. In this case application for registration of the child as a British citizen can be made to the Home Office through the British Embassy. In some circumstances application must be made within one year of the child's birth.

To open the forms below in PDF (Portable Document Format) you need Acrobat Reader which you can download from the Adobe Website free of charge.

Consular Birth Registration Form [PDF, 61KB]

Maternity/Paternity Declaration [PDF 7KB]