Place of birth - East Pakistan or Bangladesh?

[pm5k 129]

For those born in Bangladesh pre-1971, does one write “Bangladesh” as the place of birth (current sovereignty), Pakistan (which had jurisdiction at the time), or East Pakistan (technically most acvurate but does not exist anymore)?

[Yuliya Lipina 64]

37 minutes ago, pm5k said:

For those born in Bangladesh pre-1971, does one write “Bangladesh” as the place of birth (current sovereignty), Pakistan (which had jurisdiction at the time), or East Pakistan (technically most acvurate but does not exist anymore)?

What does your birth certificate say? Mine for example says Democratic Republic of Germany (a non-existent country at this point) aka East Germany. I put Germany on my application.

[pm5k 129]

Unfortunately no birth certificate is available.  This is confusing because "East Pakistan" was a province of Pakistan, not a country that no longer exists.  So all those born there were technically born in Pakistan.  That means that people born in Bangladesh before 1971 were technically born in Pakistan also.  

 

However, if one was to go to a birth registrar and obtain a birth certificate copy, it may say "Bangladesh" (Bangladesh recently computerized all birth records, so any new requests would be processed in the new format).  Bangladeshis born before 1971 in the areas that are now Bangladesh will most likely have "Bangladesh" as their place of birth.

 

Also,  the US department of state rules say that if "East Pakistan" is shown as a place of birth on a passport application, it should be written as "Bangladesh"

Edited December 14, 2017 by pm5k

[pm5k 129]

In your case, did you just write "Germany", or did you write the full form of the non-existant East Germany?

[pm5k 129]

Circling back here, in case anyone is in this situation.

 

It seems like writing "Pakistan" on the I-130 will prompt USCIS/NVC to later request Pakistani documents.  Writing "Bangladesh" will prompt them to request Bangladeshi documents if there is an RFE.    In the absence of the I-130 instructions specifying current country of sovereignty vs historical, it seems like one could write what matches their birth certificate as suggested by @Yuliya Lipina   YMMV.