5 | PROTECTING STATELESS PERSONS FROM ARBITRARY DETENTION IN MALTA INTRODUCING THE INTERVIEWEES Ibrahim was born in Sierra Leone. He grew up in the countryside with his grandparents but eventually his parents sent him to his maternal aunt in Gambia. He lived there most of his life, in a refugee camp. When he arrived in Malta he applied for international protection, failed, and consequently remained in detention for 18 months. He was released from detention as an undocumented migrant, a status that offers nothing in terms of social protection or entitlements and that has no long-term prospect of regularisation. The authorities of Sierra Leone visited him twice on the request of the Maltese Immigration Police, and refused to take him back or to confirm him as a Sierra Leonean national. He has nowhere to go. Davin was born in the Kurdish region of Syria. He says that, along with many other ethnic Kurds from Syria, he has been stateless since birth. Wanted by the authorities for having organised a gathering in the Kurdish community, and having being arrested several times and beaten up severely, Davin decided to leave his country and his family and look for safety. Upon reaching Malta in 2012, he was detained for seven months. At one point he unsuccessfully tried to escape to another European country as he found detention too hard to cope with. He was recognised as a refugee in 2013 but remains stateless. Kafil is a Rohingya Muslim, born in Rakhine State of Myanmar. The Rohingya were arbitrarily deprived of their nationality through a discriminatory citizenship law in 1982. They are stateless, despite the fact that they have been living in the Rakhine state for generations. The Rohingya also suffer significant discrimination, abuse and persecution in Myanmar. Threatened with arbitrary arrest, Kafil escaped his country alone. Trying to reach Italy, he arrived in Malta and was detained for four months and 10 days before he was recognised as a refugee. He continues to live without a nationality. Tsegaye was born in Addis Ababa, to an Eritrean mother. After being deported to Eritrea with her family, she escaped to Sudan when she was just a teenager in order to avoid compulsory conscription. After crossing the desert and the Mediterranean Sea, she ended up in detention in Malta for eight months although she was still a minor at the time. Finally released on account of her age, but rejected by the Office of Refugee Commissioner, she was adopted by a Maltese family when she was 17 years old, thereby becoming a Maltese citizen. Without this adoption, she would not have been recognised by any state.