Today millions of people around the world are denied a nationality. They often aren’t allowed to go to school, see a doctor, get a job, open a bank account, buy a house or even get married.
A Stateless person is
someone who is not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law.
In our world today,
more than 10,000,000 people
are told they don’t belong ANYWHERE
of which
more than 1/3 are children.
Every 10 minutes, a child is born stateless.
WHY ARE PEOPLE STATELESS?
Gaps in Nationality Laws
States generally confer nationality at birth through descent or through birth on the territory, or combination of the two. A conflict of these laws may lead to statelessness.
Lack of Birth Registration and Documentation
Birth registration indicates birth place and parentage. Lacking it creates risk of statelessness. In 2013, UNICEF, estimated that 230 million children under the age of 5 did not have their births registered.
Gender Discrimination
More than 60 countries do not grant women equal rights with men to acquire, confer, change or retain their nationality. 27 countries do not allow mothers to pass on their nationality to children on the same basis as men.
Administrative Obstacles
Even entitled citizens are sometimes unable to fulfill all nationality application steps, due to lack of documents, unrealistic deadlines, geographic barriers or illiteracy. In times of conflict, difficulties are exacerbated.
Ethnic and Religious Discrimination
Some states allow only members of certain ethnic, religious beliefs or other distinct groups to acquire citizenship. Discrimination also plays a role in how laws are administered.
State Succession or Dissolution
Statelessness can occur during state succession or dissolution, when territory comes under the control of another State where new laws discriminate against particular minorities.
Inheritance of Statelessness
Statelessness can be intergenerational, whereby a parent’s lack of nationality is passed on to the child, making them stateless at birth.
CASE IN POINT: SYRIA
In Syria, hundreds of thousands of children are at risk of statelessness due the sheer volume of exodus, obstacles to birth registration, destroyed civil registries and discriminatory nationality law giving nationality conference right solely to fathers.
Δ 140,000
Children born stateless in neighboring countries
Δ 8,000
Minors have crossed the border without an adult (let alone documentation)
Δ 80%
Unregistered births in Lebanon (at least 36,000)
Δ 300,000
Unregistered refugees in Lebanon
Δ 30%
Unregistered births in Jordan
Δ 60,000
Babies born in exile in Turkey
Δ 750,000
Potentially unregistered refugees in Turkey
How UNHCR helps the Statelessness people?
Since 2014, UNHCR launched the global #IBelong campaign aimed at ending within 10 years the problem of statelessness. The goal of eradicating statelessness is looking increasingly possible thanks to dramatic recent progress in the number of States acceding to two key UN human rights treaties.
Governments establish who their nationals are. This makes them responsible for legal and policy reforms that are necessary to effectively address statelessness. But UNHCR, other agencies, regional organizations, civil society and stateless people all have roles to play in supporting their efforts.
To make a difference, we must work together on each of the four areas of our work on statelessness – identification, prevention, reduction and protection. These contributions to our work allow us to prepare and recommend the most effective solutions.
Successful Case
The Kyrgyz Republic has today become a leading example of how statelessness can be eradicated by bringing the number of stateless people in the country from over 13,000 to zero in just five years.