Oxford Monitor of Forced Migration Vol. 7 No. 2 The Identification of the Statelessness of Refugees in the Asylum Procedure The Swedish Migration Agency, Migrationsverket, (hereafter SMA) is the authority responsible for establishing and assessing the identity (including nationality or statelessness) of refugees. UNHCR has reported that in Sweden ‘no comprehensive determination of an applicant’s potential statelessness takes place during the asylum procedure’ (UNHCR, 2016: 20). Due to the lack of law, policy, and guidance, in certain situations the SMA are not able to determine the citizenship or statelessness of the applicant, categorising some people as having “unknown citizenship” Okänt medborgarskap or citizenship “under investigation” Under utredning. Guidelines on how and when these classifications are to be used have not been produced (ibid). Despite the lack of clarity on the assessment of statelessness, the Migration Court of Appeal has previously recognised that while statelessness is not grounds in and of itself to grant refugee status, statelessness, understood as membership of a social group, can be considered alongside the asylum seeker’s other individual circumstances (Migrationsöverdomstolen, 2008b). With regard to the asylum procedure, following a submission of an application for asylum, the SMA will conduct interviews. During these interviews, questions related to the applicant’s country of origin and/or citizenship are raised. This is part of a credibility assessment for the asylum claim, which includes determining where the applicant was born, their country of origin and which languages they speak (Migrationsverket, 2016g). These questions do not have the specific intention of determining a person’s citizenship or identifying their potential statelessness. All SMA asylum caseworkers are expected to be able to determine the nationality or statelessness of asylum seekers, using relevant legal provisions related to nationality in the country of origin (UNHCR, 2016). However, a crucial part of determining statelessness is also to consider the operation of the nationality law. It is unclear to what extent this is taken into account by the caseworkers when they are making such assessments. As will be discussed below, no information or guidance on how the operation of the law can be assessed, in general, or for specific countries, is given in any of the sources on which the SMA caseworkers can draw. In response to the limited guidance received by SMA caseworkers on the establishment of the identity including the nationality of applicants, the SMA adopted a legal position (Rattling ställningstagande) in March 2016 on examining and determining identity and citizenship of asylum seekers, followed by another in June 2016 on the concept of regular place of residence (vanlig vistelseort) for stateless applicants (UNCHR, 2016). While these provided some information to caseworkers on which country, or countries, a determination of a stateless asylum applicant’s claim should be made, they also reaffirmed that “[t]he one who claims to be stateless must make this probable” [emphasis added] (ibid: 38). Stateless asylum seekers are thus expected to raise their statelessness during the interview and make their claim probable. This can be problematic, as not all stateless people can prove they are stateless, while others may not raise it for a variety of reasons, such as the fear that it would negatively affect their claim. 9 The Swedish practice whereby applicants have to make their 9 It is not argued here that all asylum seekers should be considered stateless until proved otherwise. Rather, as UNHCR (2014) guidance on the coordination of refugee and statelessness determination procedures notes, it is 25