States must protect stateless refugees and asylum-seekers: UN human rights experts

“The launch of the Global Alliance to End Statelessness is a key opportunity to accelerate efforts to eradicate statelessness. This serious global human rights issue affects millions of people who are deprived of a nationality. As a result, they face barriers in accessing services essential for realizing their human rights to education, employment, and healthcare, among others.

There has been significant progress towards eradicating statelessness since the launch of UNHCR’s decade-long #IBelong campaign in 2014, including the acquisition or confirmation of nationality for more than 500,000 stateless people – and at regional levels, the adoption by the African Union in February 2024 of a new Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the specific issues of the right to a nationality and the eradication of statelessness in Africa and in December 2023, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights’ adoption of Resolution 2/23 on the right to a nationality, and prohibition of arbitrary deprivation of nationality and statelessness. Nevertheless, more needs to be done by States worldwide.

At the end of 2023, UNHCR reported that at least 4.4 million people remain stateless or are of undetermined nationality – which is based on data for just 95 countries. The real number is widely recognized to be much higher.

Among the reported stateless population, there are 1.3 million stateless persons who are also forcibly displaced. In some instances, stateless people may flee their countries for reasons unrelated to their statelessness, such as conflict. However, in many cases, their lack of nationality itself is a cause of their flight, as it is linked to discrimination, denial of rights, or other forms of persecution.

We are particularly concerned that refugees and asylum-seekers who are stateless or at risk of statelessness face additional and significant challenges, often further complicating their vulnerability and hindering the enjoyment of their human rights.

As a result of their status or flight, stateless refugees often lack documents proving their identity or family links. They may be classified as having ‘unknown nationality’ or be arbitrarily assigned a nationality based on their country of former habitual residence or language. All of these may further complicate efforts to resolve their lack of nationality, receive protection as a refugee, or access other procedures such as family reunification; and may complicate eventual return to their home country. They may also face the risk of prolonged and arbitrary detention, due to lack of documentation or for other reasons associated with their status. Women asylum-seekers and refugees may be at higher risk of statelessness due to discriminatory nationality laws, also impacting on the nationality and risk of statelessness of their children.

Stateless refugees and asylum-seekers can face barriers in registering the birth of their children and receiving birth certificates, as they are frequently unable to provide necessary documentation. While children born to stateless refugees or asylum-seekers may be eligible to acquire the nationality of the country of birth if they would otherwise be stateless, if the parents’ nationality status is not accurately registered and coordination between civil registration or other relevant authorities is lacking, these children are unlikely to benefit from the nationality provision and will also be stateless.

The PIERR fully supports initiatives aimed at addressing these human rights issues, eliminating statelessness, and ensuring refugee protection.

We call on States to take steps to implement the relevant international human rights norms and standards to enhance the protection of stateless refugees and asylum-seekers and to eradicate statelessness, including to:

• Accede to the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and establish statelessness determination procedures to grant protection status to stateless people.
• Support the training of government officials responsible for refugee status determination, to identify and refer stateless people to relevant procedures to determine statelessness and refugee status. When an applicant raises both a refugee and a statelessness claim, each claim needs to be assessed and both types of status explicitly recognized.
• Accede to the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness and introduce safeguards to prevent statelessness at birth and later in life.
• Facilitate the naturalization of stateless persons, including refugees.
• Ensure that the births of refugee children are registered, and that every child receives a birth certificate.
• Incorporate flexibility into procedures for family reunification and resettlement to take into account the specific situation of stateless refugees and asylum-seekers.

We urge States, international and regional institutions, and others to join or engage with the Global Alliance to End Statelessness to harness our collective efforts.

The PIERR members stand ready to cooperate with States and the international community to work towards greater protection of and solutions for refugees and asylum-seekers, including those who are stateless.

Notes to the editor:

About statelessness

Statelessness can be caused by a number of factors, such as discrimination in nationality laws – for instance based on gender, race or religion – conflict between or gaps in nationality laws, or State succession. Being undocumented is not the same as being stateless, but lack of identity documentation and birth registration can increase the risk of statelessness, in particular when combined with other factors, such as forced displacement.

About the PIERR

The PIERR is currently composed of the mandates of the United Nations Special Rapporteurs on the:

• trafficking in persons, especially women and children 
• human rights of migrants
• Working Group on arbitrary detention
• UN Committee against Torture
• Special Rapporteur on Refugees, Asylum seekers, Internally Displaced persons and Migrants in Africa of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights
• Rapporteurship on Human Mobility of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

The Platform is supported by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency.

For more information on the PIERR, please refer to the PIERR website.

Platform members

• Siobhán Mullally, PIERR Chair and UN Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially women and children
• Gehad Madi, UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants
• Matthew Gillett (Chair-Rapporteur) and Priya Gopalan (Vice-Chair on Follow-Up), UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention
• Jorge Contesse, Member of the Committee against Torture
• Selma Sassi-Safer, Commissioner and Special Rapporteur on Refugees, Asylum seekers, Internally Displaced Persons and Migrants in Africa of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights
• Andrea Pochak, Commissioner and Rapporteur on Human Mobility of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

For additional information and media requests please contact:

• OHCHR: Dharisha Indraguptha ([email protected]) or Federica Donati ([email protected])
• UNHCR: Shabia Mantoo ([email protected] +41 79 337 7650) or Kelleen Corrigan ([email protected])