Dua Lipa is often called a British pop star. And that’s correct. She was born in London, but the most accurate descriptor is British-Kosovar Albanian. Lipa’s parents, Anesa and Dukagjin, emigrated to the UK from Pristina in Kosovo. Lipa was named an Honorary Ambassador of Kosovo ahead of her annual Sunny Hill Festival in August, and today (November 27), she celebrated the ultimate step in honoring her Albanian heritage.
Lipa took to Instagram this morning to share footage of gaining Albanian citizenship. “Thank you President Bajram Begaj and Mayor @erionveliaj for this honor ~ got my Albanian citizenship!!” she captioned to carousel, adding a sentence in Albanian that translates to, “Thank you, I am feeling very proud.”
Rina Lipa, the 27-year-old’s sister, commented four heart emojis. DJ Snake and Major Lazer were among those showing Lipa love in the comments section.
“Everything was Albanian at home, and English was my school life,” Lipa told Vanity Fair as the publication’s July/August 2021 cover star. “I had so much family in Kosovo, but also because of the situation and not being able to go back, I had never really met my family.”
Lipa continued to explain that she wasn’t aware as a child of the ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and open conflict in the region that forced her parents to flee. “I guess my parents also didn’t want to upset me at such a young age,” she added. “After the war, my dad’s father passed away, and my dad couldn’t make it back in time, because obviously all the borders were closed, but it was just one of those things they didn’t tell me until a little bit later on.”
Earlier this year, this time on the cover of Vogue, Lipa further detailed her international childhood — moving from London to Kosovo at age 11.
According to Billboard, Lipa’s Albanian citizenship comes ahead of the country’s 110th “anniversary of independence from the Ottoman Empire,” and the ceremony recognized how Lipa has used her platform to uplift Albanian people. The three-time Grammy winner spearheads the Sunny Hill Foundation, “a charity organization set up in Prishtina-Kosovo under the patronage of” Lipa.
Dua Lipa is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.