The Syrian Initiative to Combat Statelessness of an invalid marriage shall be attributed to the husband.” Mention should also be made of article 51 of the law, which stipulates that the consummation of an invalid marriage results in “filiation as prescribed in article 133.” The first paragraph of this article stipulates, “if a woman gave birth from unlawful intercourse within the limits of the specified period of pregnancy, the child shall be attributed to the man.” Articles 134 and 135 specify the provisions regarding filiation. Paragraph 2 of article 134 stipulates, “if the declarant is a married woman or a woman in her waiting period, filiation to the father shall be established only by acknowledgement or providing proof.” And according to article 135, “maternal or paternal filiation of a child of unknown parentage shall be established by the acknowledgement of the declarant and a reasonable age difference between them.” As for registering a marriage contract, article 40 of personal status law specifies the prerequisites, which also apply to “recording judgements confirming marriage, divorce, paternity...”. 76 According to article 45 of the law, the main requirements can be summarized as follows: a notarized marriage certificate for the husband with his entire personal data and national number. The same applies for the wife, her guardian, and two adult male witnesses. Other documents are required to be attached to a marriage certificate, i.e. a marriage license for the man, issued by the directorate of military recruitment; the chosen address, in addition to stating deferred and prompt dowry and the date of the marriage contract, which is crucial to prove marital status (by which pregnancy duration is calculated). In case any of these prerequisites are missing, the marriage contract is considered invalid, therefore, it cannot be registered in the Shariah court according to the shariah judiciary. With taking into consideration the extraordinary living circumstances faced by Syrians under internal and external displacement, establishing paternity becomes almost impossible, especially in cases where the requirements and conditions stipulated by the law cannot be met. For instance, the lack of a “valid marriage contract,” for being lost or unrecognized by the countries of asylum, e.g. for being issued by entities outside of the Syrian government control, means failure to register the marriage, therefore, failure to establish paternity. In these cases, children born to Syrian mothers cannot be granted the Syrian nationality. As mentioned above, failure to meet any of the requirements to confirm a