13 | PROTECTING STATELESS PERSONS FROM ARBITRARY DETENTION IN BULGARIA been ratified according to the constitutionally established procedure, that are promulgated and that have entered into force for the Republic of Bulgaria are part of the domestic law of the country and take precedence over domestic legislation that contradicts them. Article 5(4) of the Bulgarian Constitution was invoked by the SCAC also in Judgment of 21 December 2013 in case No.6735/2013 in relation to the direct application of Article 25, paragraph 1 of the 1954 Statelessness Convention.29 The Court found that the requirement of Article 27(2) of the Law on Foreign Nationals in the Republic of Bulgaria (LFRB) that the applicant for a residence permit shall present a valid travel document contradicted Article 25, paragraph 1 of the 1954 Convention, which requires state authorities to assist the applicant when the exercise of a right by a stateless person would normally require the assistance of authorities of a foreign country to whom he cannot have recourse. Article 27(2) LFRB provides that the term of the residence permit can be prolonged for up to six months before the validity of the national travel document of the applicant expires. The requirement under Article 27(2) LFRB is a common obstacle to grant or prolong the residence permit of migrants who do not have a national passport (travel document) or are unable to prolong its validity. Thus, during an interview with experts from the Bulgarian Commission for Protection against Discrimination (CPD),30 they told the story of a stateless person of Palestinian origin, Mr. Karsholi, who had fallen into a vicious cycle of impossibility to renew his travel document by the Palestinian embassy in Sofia because of the requirement to do so in Palestine. At the same time, he did not have a travel document to leave Bulgaria lawfully. As a result, he had remained undocumented in Bulgaria. Mr. Karsholi had submitted an application to renew his Bulgarian permanent residence permit as he is the husband of a Bulgarian citizen and father of three children who are Bulgarian citizens. Mr. Karsholi’s application for a valid identity card and a valid travel document was rejected by the Bulgarian Migration Directorate with the reasoning that “there is no possibility in the law to provide the requested service”. Mr. Karsholi complained before the Bulgarian Commission for Protection against Discrimination claiming that he suffered discrimination on ground of his ‘citizenship’ and ‘national origin’. By Decision No.190 of 1 September 2010 the CPD found that Mr. Karsholi had suffered such unequal treatment and discrimination. In accordance with its powers, the CPD made a proposal to the Ministry of the Interior to initiate a procedure for the accession of Bulgaria to the 1954 Statelessness Convention. The Migration Directorate appealed the CPD decision, but the latter was confirmed by the Judgment of 5 August 2011 of the SAC of the Republic of Bulgaria in case No.13338/2010. Under Bulgarian national law, upon meeting certain specific conditions, it is possible for a narrow category of stateless persons to acquire a ‘permanent’ residence permit without having to provide a valid travel document.31 Although the resident permit is called ‘permanent’, it is valid for only one year and one has to reapply for and renew it every year. However, even in those cases the person is not recognised as stateless, but it is assumed that the citizenship of the person is ‘unknown’. The national provision in question is Article 25, paragraph 1, point 12 of the LFRB.32 It sets the following cumulative conditions in order for one to qualify for this residence permit: 1. 2. 3. the foreigner should have been born in Bulgaria or entered the country prior to 27 December 1998; he/she should have stayed in Bulgaria ever since then and should not have left the country; the foreigner should be from a former Soviet republic, but should not have been recognised as a citizen by any of those republics. Bulgarian case law concerning stateless persons deals mainly with the application of Article 25, paragraph 1, point 12 of LFRB. In the majority of these cases the appeal is submitted by persons of Armenian origin who have spent their lives in Bulgaria.33 In all those cases,34 upon official request by the Bulgarian Migration Directorate, the Consul of the Republic of Armenia in Bulgaria has replied that the person in question does not possess a national passport and a registered address in Armenia, but according to Article 10, paragraph 3 of the Law on the Citizenship of the Republic of Armenia the citizens of the former Soviet Union who live abroad, who are of Armenian origin and who have not received the citizenship of another state are considered to be Armenian citizens. Nevertheless, the SCAC has repealed these refusals to grant residence permits under Article 25, paragraph 1, point 12 of LFRB, stating that they were unlawful. The Court found a violation of the requirement of Article 35 of the Code on Administrative Procedure to establish all relevant facts in the case. Namely, according to the Court, the administrative authorities had not fully clarified whether the applicant fell within the scope of the cited provision of the Law on the Citizenship of the Republic of Armenia in view of the existence of additional conditions that the applicant might have to meet. The Court further found a violation of the right to respect for private and family life under Article 8 of the ECHR in view of the applicants’ social integration in Bulgaria and the lack of social and family ties in Armenia. The Law on Bulgarian Citizenship (Article 14) provides that stateless persons are entitled to submit an application for Bulgarian citizenship once they have completed three years as holders of a permanent residence permit. In view of the lack of a legal definition of