Refusing Refusal the Swedish government has been critiqued for not defining statelessness or creating a particular procedure for determining statelessness. 64 The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (‘UNHCR’) has recommended that Sweden implement changes in this regard. The UNHCR has also suggested that Sweden should introduce a residence permit specific for stateless persons ‘who, due to their statelessness, have no country to return to, and who today receive residence permits not corresponding to their protection needs as stateless persons’. 65 The only relevant concern that has been taken on is the suggestion regarding relieving mechanisms in the naturalisation processes for stateless people born in Sweden. 66 For persons whose asylum applications have been rejected and who are to be deported, but cannot for practical reasons be removed, temporary residence permits on the grounds of ‘practical impediments to removal’ may be the only source of hope. 67 This means that there are obstacles to implement a decision to deport someone. Those obstacles could relate to, for example, violent conditions in the receiving country or a refusal on the part of the receiving country to allow entry for the deported. However, residence permits due to such impediments are rarely granted. 68 In Sweden, the majority of stateless claimants of asylum and protection are of Palestinian background 69 with a history of refugeeness ultimately originating in dispossession and displacement of the nakba (catastrophe) in 1948. 70 Many are ‘multiple refugees’, 71 as the Palestinian refugee situation is not only continuous but repeated in relation to various wars and insecurities in the Middle East. In addition, Palestinians represent a population involved in mixed migration patterns, as refugees from 1948 resettled in, for example, the Gulf countries, seeking their relative fortune in the oil economies 72 where statelessness was perpetuated and residence required sponsorship from employers. Although Palestinians may uphold a variety of citizenships, statelessness remain a feature of their collective predicament as a people. 73 The number of stateless asylum claimants in Sweden during the 2012–20 period amounted to 29,351, with a high of 7,863 in 2014 and low of 376 in 2020. 74 The 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 Mapping Statelessness in Sweden (Report, UNHCR Regional Representation for Northern Europe December 2016) 33 (‘Mapping Statelessness’). UNHCR Recommendations to Sweden on Strengthening Refugee Protection in Sweden, Europe and Globally (Report, UNHCR 22 June 2020) 8 (‘UNHCR Recommendations’). Ändrade regler i medborgarskapslagen (Report No 2021:54, Statens Offentliga Utredningar 2 July 2021) 53–72. Uppehållstillstån Report (n 63). Lundberg (n 23). Mapping Statelessness (n 63) 26. Note that as a signatory to the UN 1954 Convention (n 21), Sweden has a number of requirements to fulfil. Sweden has also signed the UNHCR Global Action Plan to End Statelessness: 2014–2024 (Report, UNHCR 2013), which aims to ‘eliminate statelessness’ by 2024. See Ilan Pappé, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (One World Oxford 2006). Fiddian-Quasmiyeh (n 43) 279 See Ann M Lesch, ‘Palestinians in Kuwait’ (1991) 20(4) Journal of Palestine Studies 42, 42– 43. Gabiam (n 15) 486. Statistikservice, ‘Asylsökande under året efter medborgarskapsland och kön. År 2002 – 2020’, SCB (Web Page, 18 March 2021) <https://www.statistikdatabasen.scb.se/pxweb/sv/ssd/START__BE__BE0101__BE0101P/A sylsokande/#>. 275