Breaking the Presumption
regarding the late birth registry of children, these administrative norms should
include an expedited registry of applicants’ children or descendants. 99
VIII CONCLUSION
Certainly, nationality is considered to be a stateless person’s happy ending.
Naturalisation, a citizenship granted by states to those considered foreigners or
immigrants, is one of the main goals of SDP norms. This is both for protection
purposes and because naturalisation definitively facilitates the applicant’s
integration into the society. SDP norms assume or presume that applicants are
foreigners, and once recognised as stateless as a result of this process, they should
have a route to access documentation (ID and residence) and naturalisation.
SDP applicants must be within the territory of the state to present their
application. 100 However, international standards recommend that SDPs are not
applicable to in situ stateless. This population has largely been born in, or have
strong links with, the territory, and are likely entitled to the right to nationality by
constitution or law. Despite accurate statistics on statelessness remaining a
challenge, it has been determined that most in situ stateless peoples in the world
belong to discriminated minority groups, who are arbitrarily deprived of
citizenship by acts and omissions of the state. In these cases, the remedy or
solution is the immediate restoration and ‘validation of nationality’ through law,
judicial and administrative measures, documentation and the effective enjoyment
and exercise of nationality rights.
SDPs should not be used as a political tool by states. Stateless people who have
the right to nationality must not be forced to apply to an SDP to be granted a
second-class citizenship though a naturalisation formula. This allows governments
to maintain a continuous threat of stripping the nationality granted by
naturalisation. Therefore, SDPs should neither be applicable to prima facie or
collective statelessness recognition in contexts of structural discrimination of
minority groups.
Express dispositions in SDP laws or norms concerning procedures for cases
where an applicant could be identified as a national of the country raise a ‘red flag’
against the presumption that SDP applicants are foreigners. The safeguards on
SDP norms identified in Costa Rica, Paraguay, Panama, Argentina, Georgia,
The procedural requirements of both nationality campaigns and nationality verification
procedures will be similar to those used in statelessness determination procedures in practice, as
they need to reflect the forms of evidence available in a country and the difficulties faced by
applicants in proving their nationality status.
99
See ICCPR (n 41) art 24(2); Convention on the Rights of the Child, opened for signature 20
November 1989, 1577 UNTS 3 (entered into force 2 September 1990) arts 3(1), 3(2), 7(1)
and 7(2), also signed by the 23 SDP countries identified for this article. The special procedure
on late birth registration shall also ensure citizenship acquisition.
Birth registration is the permanent recording of a child’s existence and does not confer
nationality. Nationality is acquired through the operation of a State’s nationality law. The two
processes are distinct. Nonetheless, birth registration helps to prevent statelessness because it
establishes a legal record as to where a child was born and who his/her parents are, elements of
information key to proving entitlement to nationality.
Good Practice Papers, Action 7 (Ensuring Birth Registration for Prevention of Statelessness)
(Report, UNHCR 2017) 3. See also ‘#IBelong Campaign’ (n 4): Action 2: Ensure that no
child is born stateless, Action 3: Remove gender discrimination from nationality laws, and
Action 8: Issue nationality documentation to those with entitlement to it.
100 The 23 SDP norms identified for this article require that the applicant shall be within the
boundaries of the state; if the applicant is in the border, as refugee international standards, the
state shall facilitate the access to SDP.
85