IMP LEMENTATIO N IF YOUR PROJECT IS • Homelessness TARGETED TO STATELESS • Unemployment PERSONS, YOU MUST • Detention risk or detained • Mixed origin/parentage THINK CAREFULLY ABOUT • Undocumented WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF • Pregnant women YOU FIND THAT A CLIENT OR POTENTIAL CLIENT IS NOT STATELESS. • Trafficked • Insecure migration/residency status • Unaccompanied or separated minors or elderly • Child laborer • Born to unmarried parents • Parents undocumented Risk of statelessness is a complicated type of vulnerability. People with this risk are vulnerable to being left without a nationality, but are not necessarily stateless today. Confirming whether a person is stateless according to the state is not possible in a client interview. It may be useful to think of statelessness on a continuum. For example, if a client has no proof of his or her nationality, and is likely to experience difficulties getting proof, but has not yet tried to get it, they are not yet stateless, but they may have a high risk of statelessness. Other vulnerability factors can increase risk of statelessness. Groups particularly at risk of statelessness, especially if they are undocumented, include nomadic or pastoral groups with links to two or more countries; borderdwelling groups; ethnic, religious, or linguistic minorities; displaced populations; and irregular migrants and their descendants, among others. Determining someone’s nationality or statelessness status might involve contacting consulates of countries to which an individual has links. Care must be taken to ensure that clients—or potential clients—understand the implications of this before consenting to such processes, particularly when they are benefiting from international protection. If your project is targeted to stateless persons, you must think carefully about what will happen if you find that a client or potential client is not stateless. Nationals who lack documentation can face the same everyday reality and barriers to accessing rights as those without a nationality, so you may not wish to disqualify people who have a nationality but lack documentation, which can indeed expose individuals to a risk of statelessness. Urgency Paralegal projects often consider cases to be urgent based on the following criteria: • Cases involving violence • Pressing need to access service, e.g. healthcare • Birth registration or citizenship application cut-off date approaching • Pregnant woman 94 | A C O M M U N I T Y- B A S E D P R A C T I T I O N E R ’ S G U I D E : D O C U M E N T I N G C I T I Z E N S H I P A N D OT H E R F O R M S O F L E G A L I D E N T I T Y