WUNRN
STATELESSNESS - NO NATIONAL IDENTITY
- DISCRIMINATION & DENIAL OF RIGHTS - WOMEN & CHILDREN
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Women's Refugee Commission
Statelessness
- Gender
An
estimated 12 million
people worldwide are stateless, with no country to call home. They are not
recognized as nationals of the countries where they live, and as a result are
denied basic human rights. For many people, this situation arises because of
gender discrimination in nationality laws. This occurs when nationality
legislation prevents women from acquiring, changing, retaining or passing on
their nationality to their children and/or their spouses on an equal basis with
men.
Being stateless has grave consequences, often leading to violations of fundamental human rights. Stateless people face many barriers and obstacles: without citizenship or identity documents they are unable to own or rent property, secure formal employment or access services such as public health care, education and social welfare benefits. Statelessness impacts individuals' ability to marry and couples' decisions to start a family.
Twenty-four countries around the world, 11 of them in the Middle East and North Africa, still have discriminatory nationality laws that make it impossible for women to transfer their nationality to their children or to their non-national spouses. It also impacts inheritance and property rights, leaving those affected unable to transfer their financial and material resources to their children.
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OUR MOTHERLAND, OUR COUNTRY - GENDER DISCRIMINATION & STATELESSNESS: MIDDLE EAST & NORTH AFRICA
Direct Link to 36-Page 2013 Report: http://www.womensrefugeecommission.org/resources/refugee-protection/942-our-motherland-our-country-gender-discrimination-and-statelessness-in-the-middle-east-and-north-africa-1/file
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Statelessness
- No Nationality, No Future - Video
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Stateless
Children - Girls - Under the Radar & Under Protected - Rights
UNHCR & PLAN - Direct
Link to Full 16-Page 2012 Report:
There are an estimated six
million stateless children around the world1 –
children without a nationality who don’t belong to any country – whose lives
are insecure and futures uncertain. Many stateless children are denied access
to education and health care. They are particularly vulnerable to exploitation
and abuse, including being trafficked, forced into hazardous labour and sexual exploitation,
locked up alongside adults and deported.
Addressing statelessness is a
vital step towards ensuring that millions of children can escape the cycle of
marginalization and claim their rights to build better futures.Yet, despite
these dangers and the risks that stateless children face, few international or national
child protection systems include stateless children in their programming. This
needs to change.
Nationality
is a legal bond between an individual and a State. States normally grant
nationality either through descent, whereby children acquire the nationality of
their parents ( jus sanguinis), or through a child’s birth
on a country’s territory ( jus soli). Most countries grant nationality by a
combination of both birth and descent. A stateless person is someone who is not
considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law.
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UN Conventions on
Statelessness
© UNHCR/G.Amarasinghe
Key
for
Protecting the Stateless
The 1954 Convention relating to the Status
of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness
are key legal instruments in the protection of stateless people around the
world and in the prevention and reduction of statelessness. While they are
complemented by regional treaty standards and international human rights law,
the two statelessness conventions are the only global conventions of their
kind.
The conventions attracted relatively few
ratifications or accessions for decades. So, in 2011, to mark the 50th
anniversary of the 1961 Convention, UNHCR launched a major campaign to promote
accession to the two statelessness treaties. The campaign quickly produced
results. There have been 32 accessions since the campaign was launched. In
order of accession: Panama (1954 and 1961 Conventions); Nigeria (1954 and
1961); Philippines (1954); Croatia (1961); Serbia (1961); Turkmenistan (1954);
Benin (1954 and 1961); Georgia (1954); Bulgaria (1954 and 1961); Moldova (1954
and 1961); Burkina Faso (1954); Paraguay (1961); Turkmenistan (1961); Ecuador
(1961); Honduras (1954); Portugal (1954 and 1961); Honduras (1961); Jamaica
(1961); Ukraine (1954 and 1961); Nicaragua (1954); Lithuania (1961); Nicaragua
(1961); Cote d’Ivoire (1954 and 1961) and Montenegro (1961).
This increased the number of state parties
to the 1954 Convention from 65 to 79 and the number of state parties to the
1961 Convention from 37 to 55.
Further good news came at UNHCR's landmark
ministerial conference in
For more history on the 1954 and 1961
Statelessness Conventions, please visit the United Nations Audiovisual Archive
of International Law at:
http://untreaty.un.org/cod/avl/historicarchives.html#refugees
1954 Convention
·
1954 Convention relating to the
Status of Stateless Persons
·
Signatory
States, Declarations and Reservations (external link)
·
Objectives and key provisions of the
1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons
1961 Convention
·
1961 Convention on the Reduction of
Statelessness
·
Signatory
States, Declarations and Reservations (external link)
·
Objectives and key provisions of the
1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness