8. Annexes 8.1. Extract from General Comment on Article 6 of the ACRWC African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, Article 6: Name and Nationality 1. Every child shall have the right from his birth no a name. 2. Every child shall be registered immediately after birth. 3. Every child has the right to acquire a nationality. 4. States Parties to the present Charter shall undertake to ensure that their Constitutional legislation recognize the principles according to which a child shall acquire the nationality of the State in the territory of which he has been born if, at the time of the child’s birth, he is not granted nationality by any other State in accordance with its laws. General Comment on Article 6 of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, ACERWC/GC/02 (2014), adopted by the Committee at its twenty-third Ordinary Session, 7 - 16 April, 2014. Full text, including footnotes, available at : http://acerwc.org/the-committees-work/generalcomments/ […] Right to acquire a nationality: Art 6 (3) and the obligation to prevent statelessness: Art 6 (4) 83. The right to a nationality has a central importance for the recognition and respect for other rights: thus the prevention of statelessness, including the statelessness of children, is a fundamental principle of international human rights law. The Committee of Experts has held that, “One of the main purposes of Article 6, in particular Article 6(4), of the African Children’s Charter, is to prevent and/or reduce statelessness.” A person who is stateless is a person who is “not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law”: this definition, found in Article 1(1) of the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, has been recognised by the Committee of Experts to constitute part of customary international law. 84. Even if the vast majority of human rights are not formally restricted on the basis of nationality, the lack of a recognised nationality in practice has a profoundly negative impact on respect for and fulfilment of other human rights. The effective proof of nationality (usually through documentation issued by the State) is a necessary foundation not only for the exercise of rights of civic and political participation, but also freedom of movement, participation in the formal economy, and the entitlement to mobilize the protection of the State of nationality when the enjoyment of human rights is endangered or threatened. The Committee of Experts notes that, although the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights does not specifically include a provision on the right to a nationality, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has considered issues touching on the right to a nationality in a large number of communications, underlining the challenges related to nationality in Africa. Highlighting its findings in these cases, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights adopted a resolution on the right to a nationality in April 2013 stating that: “[…] the right to nationality of every human person is a fundamental human right implied within the provisions of Article 5 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and essential to the enjoyment of other fundamental rights and freedoms under the Charter.” 85. While the right to a nationality becomes of greater significance as a person approaches and reaches adulthood, it is critical for the right to a nationality to be recognised for children. This is both because the clear recognition of nationality from the moment of birth is the best guarantee that 100