-Published:Thursday, October 10, 2019-
U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees warns of risks to the fight against statelessness
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The U.N. high commissioner for refugees, Filippo Grandi, warned on Monday that recent advances in the battle to end statelessness, considered by the organization as a leading cause of human rights deprivation for millions of people worldwide, were being imperiled by a rise in damaging forms of nationalism.
In Geneva ahead of the opening Monday of the refugee agency annual executive committee meeting, Grandi said that the growing number of countries taking action against statelessness meant the international community was nearing a point of critical mass in its efforts to stamp out statelessness for good.
“As recently as five years ago, public awareness of statelessness and the harm it causes was still negligible. That is changing, and today the prospect of ending statelessness entirely has never been closer,” said Grandi.
According to Grandi, the progress is far from assured because damaging forms of nationalism and the manipulation of anti-refugee and migrant sentiment are powerful currents internationally that risk putting progress into reverse.
Solutions are urgently needed for millions without citizenship or at risk of statelessness around the world, he said.
The UN Refugee Agency launched a global I Belong Campaign in 2014 aimed at ending statelessness by 2024.
According to U.N., since then some 15 countries have newly acceded to the two major treaties on statelessness, the 1954 UN Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
With additional accessions and other commitments expected this week, total accessions to the first of these treaties, the 1954 Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons, could soon exceed the threshold of 100 countries.
According to the high commissioner's report, in the first five years of the campaign, more than 220,000 stateless people have now acquired a nationality, including as as a result of concerted national efforts that have been motivated by the campaign, in places as diverse as Kyrgyzstan and Kenya, Tajikistan and Thailand.
“In July of this year Kyrgyzstan became the first country in the world to announce the complete resolution of all known cases of statelessness,” said the refugee agency in its statement.
In addition, since the campaign was launched, two countries, Madagascar and Sierra Leone, reformed their nationality laws to allow mothers to confer citizenship on their children on an equal footing with fathers.
“However, 25 countries continue to make it difficult or impossible for mothers to confer citizenship on their children, one of the leading causes of statelessness globally,” said the high commissioner in the statement. “As not all nationality laws contain safeguards that ensure that no child is born stateless, statelessness can also be passed down from generation to generation.”
Ending all forms of discrimination in nationality laws would help the international community live up to the commitment all states made when adopting the Sustainable Development Agenda to “leave no one behind,” said the report.
Monday leading figures in the media, human rights, refugee and statelessness worlds were joining member state representatives in Geneva in a special session of agency’s executive committee meeting, known as the High-Level Segment on Statelessness, to take stock of progress half way through the campaign and to commit to take more action to end statelessness by 2024.
Among those attending were U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, refugee Goodwill Ambassador Cate Blanchett, British TV journalist and presenter Anita Rani, formerly stateless refugee and activist Maha Mamo, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe high commissioner on national minorities, Lamberto Zannier and others.
A dedicated media page for the High Level Segment on Statelessness can also be accessed at UNHCR site.*
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