nationality at birth because their parents did not have a domicile. If they had a domicile at the birth, the children would automatically have acquired nationality. Therefore, the children whose parents did not have a domicile at the birth will also be automatically excluded from the acquisition of nationality through declaration. Children born to parents who are unable to pass on their nationality to their children 19. Another gap in Hungarian law which can result in the failure to prevent statelessness at birth arises from the fact that the law does not envisage situations in which parents who have a nationality may not be able to pass it on to their children, particularly when born abroad. This may happen for various reasons including gender discrimination in nationality laws in some countries, which do not allow mothers to pass on their nationality to their child under the same conditions as fathers.24 In this case, if a child is born to a mother with nationality of one of those countries and if the father is stateless, unknown or unwilling to cooperate, the child will be born stateless in Hungary and no safeguard will apply to her/him. 20. Obtaining nationality through the process of declaration can, in some cases, provide a solution. However, the restrictive application of the concept of domicile is likely to exclude a significant portion of those most in need of the safeguard. As already stated above, parents will only be able to establish a domicile in Hungary if they have already obtained a permanent resident status, subject to strict material conditions, or if they are refugees or beneficiaries of subsidiary protection. Children born to beneficiaries of international protection who are unable to pass on their nationality to their children due to impossibility or prohibition to contact the authorities of the country of origin 24 21. In addition to the situation where the country of origin has legal provisions that do not allow nationals to pass on their nationality to their children under certain circumstances, children born to beneficiaries of international protection in Hungary also face the challenge of being stateless at birth. This is because their parents may have a wellfounded reason for not contacting the authorities of their country of origin to establish and register the nationality of their children after birth. For example, such contact may expose them to a risk of persecution or serious harm and even lead to the cancellation of their protection status. Hungary has not taken sufficient consideration of this situation when designing laws to prevent statelessness at birth. 22. This impossibility or prohibition of contact applies to cases in which the transmission of nationality to children born abroad is not automatic; but it can also apply to cases in which it is automatic. In the former scenario, the children will not be able to acquire their parents’ nationality, as transmission is subject to conditions that require contact with the authorities of the country of origin. In the latter scenario, while the children will, as a matter of legal principle, acquire their parents’ nationality at birth, this would not translate to actual documentation of nationality. Furthermore, it is possible that the competent authorities in the country would question or not recognise the nationality of children born abroad to refugees. This places the child at significant risk of statelessness. 23. Again, declaration is not always a viable solution for this group of children to obtain Hungarian nationality. First, if the parents only have a tolerated status or are still in an For the list of countries, see UNHCR, Revised Background Note on Gender Equality, Nationality Laws and Statelessness, 8 March 2013, available at http://www.refworld.org/docid/4f59bdd92.html.