By October 1941, the German authorities stopped getting rid of Jews by facilitating their taking refuge in other countries and refused henceforth issue of passports or grant of exit permits. In pursuance of the above mentioned German Law of the 15th of September 1935, the German Government issued on the 25th of November 1941 a decree (the 11th Ordinance under the Reich Citizenship Law (Reichsbuergergesetz) of 15th September 1935), which laid down: (1) That a Jew who has his ordinary place of residence abroad cannot be a German national; (2) That the Jew loses his German nationality either on the date of the issue of the decree, or from the date he has taken up his ordinary residence abroad, or at a later date, when he transfers his ordinary residence abroad. A considerable number of Jews lost their nationality as a result of that Decree. It also provided for the confiscation of the property of Jews who became stateless as a result thereof. Thus all Jewish refugees (whether confessional Jews or Christian non-Aryans) living as refugees outside the territory of the Reich, and not having acquired another nationality (e.g. by immigration into Palestine or the USA) became stateless.13 The Memorandum thus describes de facto stateless persons as persons who: • • • Have a nationality; Are outside the State of their nationality; and Are refused diplomatic and consular protection by that State. Conversely, persons inside the State of their nationality are not described as de facto stateless, even if, like the German Jews in the 1930’s, they are denied civic rights to such an extent that their nationality is deprived of any positive content whatsoever under that State’s municipal law.14 The Memorandum does not consider that any person deprived of diplomatic protection and consular assistance is necessarily de facto stateless. The deprivation must be as a result of a refusal by the person’s State of nationality to provide such protection; if, on the other hand, the State is unable to provide protection – for example, because of military occupation by a foreign power, or absence of diplomatic recognition – the person concerned is not de facto stateless.15 13 14 15 Ibid., pp. 14 - 15. One may question whether, if being the national of a country has no positive content at all, one can really be considered a national of the country concerned. The same position was also taken by the International Union of Child Welfare (ICWU), a federation of national and international voluntary and semi-voluntary organizations for child welfare. See ICWU, “Stateless Children: A Comparative Study of National Legislations and Suggested Solutions to the Problem of Statelessness of Children”, 1947, p. 6: “Besides persons who are stateless on legal grounds there are nowadays an increasing number of individuals who are stateless de facto. They are unprotected persons because in reality they enjoy the protection of no government, although they have not been formally denationalised. A further distinction must be made between de facto statelessness and a temporary lack of protection. The latter position arises when persons are deprived of protection because the State to which they belong is not in a position for the time being to have diplomatic or consular representatives on the territory in which those persons are residing (military occupation, absence of diplomatic relationships, and other similar cases).” 4