Myanmar (who had previously been excluded from the statelessness statistics – hence the shift in numbers between the end of 2016 and the end of 2017, as shown in the table). Meanwhile, at the bottom of the table, Estonia and the Russian Federation have traded places because there has been a slower reduction in the number of cases of statelessness in Estonia. The newest data for Thailand, Latvia and Uzbekistan also shows a small reduction in numbers, equivalent to 1.6%, 3.7% and 6.5% of the total stateless population of each of these countries respectively. In Côte d’Ivoire, a new mapping initiative was launched in 2018,8 but the results have yet to be published and the global statistical reporting shows now change as compared to the previous year. Similarly, there was no new data for Syria or Kuwait. Where is new data reported? Just outside the overview of the ten largest reported stateless populations, in twelfth place (after Saudi Arabia), is one of the countries for which quantitative data is available for the first time: Cambodia. Having been marked with an asterisk (known statelessness situation but no reliable data) since UNHCR’s statistical reporting on statelessness began in 2004, Cambodia is now reported to have a stateless population of 57,444. No details are provided as to the profile of this population in the reporting, so its composition is not clear; nor is a source for the data provided. It elsewhere been noted that statelessness primarily affects Cambodia’s ethnic Vietnamese population. Previously, civil society and independent researchers’ estimates of the numbers affected have ranged from several tens to hundreds of thousands.9 The lack of data was understood to be a major impediment to public debate and advocacy around the statelessness of this population, so the inclusion of Cambodia in the global statistical reporting may prove important to wider efforts in relation to securing the right to a nationality and protecting the rights of stateless persons in the country. Singapore is another new addition to UNHCR’s global statelessness data, where 1,523 persons are reported as stateless. Here, an annotation is provided in a footnote, clarifying the profile of these individuals as including cases of “persons who came from other countries to live and work in Singapore and lost their foreign citizenship over time, and children born in Singapore but not eligible for Singapore citizenship at birth and whose parents [cannot] confer nationality to them”. There has been anecdotal reporting of such instances of statelessness in the country by the media in recent years, including of cases involving children born out of wedlock, or where the parents were unable to prove their marriage;10 birth to stateless parents;11 and refusal to enlist in the army.12 To date, no comprehensive analysis of the situation in the country has been produced. The third country for which a data is “new” in the latest UNHCR global statistics is Egypt, which last year was marked with an asterisk and now reported a stateless population of 4 persons. In fact, however, this is not the first time that data has been included for Egypt – rather, last year’s Global Trends report was the only occasion in the past decade in which no figure was given. In 2010, the number reported was 60 stateless persons and by the end of 2016, this figure had dropped to 19 (before being replaced with the asterisk for 2017). No further details are provided on who is included in these numbers, but the population previously 8 Layse Farias and Charlotte Arnaud, ‘UNHCR launch mapping of statelessness in Côte d’Ivoire’, UNHCR – Blogs (2018), available at: https://www.unhcr.org/blogs/mapping-statelessness-cote-divoire/. 9 See for further analysis and background on statelessness in Cambodia the Joint Submission on Cambodia to the Human Rights Council at the 32nd Session of the Universal Periodic Review by Minority Rights Organisation, Khmer Kampuchea Krom for Human Rights and Development Association, Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, Statelessness Network Asia Pacific, Minority Rights Group International (July 2018), available at: https://files.institutesi.org/UPR32_Cambodia.pdf. 10 Ng Jun Sen (The New Paper), 'Woman Who has Lived in S'pore All her Life Remains Stateless' (21 February 2016), available at: https://www.tnp.sg/news/singapore/woman-who-has-lived-spore-all-her-life-remains-stateless 11 Wong Pei Ting (TODAY), 'From Stateless to Citizen: Finally a Singaporean After 50 Years' (30 May 2017), available at: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/stateless-citizen-finally-singaporean-after-50-years 12 Wong Pei Ting (TODAY), 'Confused and Dejected, Stateless Persons Plead to be Called Singaporeans' (26 September 2016), available at: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/confused-and-dejected-stateless-persons-plead-be-called-singaporeans; TODAY 'Nearly a Singaporean' (30 January 2017), available at: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/nearly-singaporean 4