This requires consideration of the following: a) Are the rights in question only those explicitly provided for under international human rights law, or do they also include additional rights provided for under municipal law? Just as nationality is a concept of both municipal and international law, the question whether an individual’s nationality is effective or not is a question of municipal as well as international law. b) Are the rights in question only those specifically reserved for nationals, or do they also include rights that should be enjoyed by all persons within the jurisdiction of the State concerned, whether nationals or not? c) To what extent does a national have to be denied the rights in question for him or her to be de facto stateless? d) Why call such denial of rights “statelessness”? Even if the rights in question include only those reserved for nationals under international human rights law, considering non-enjoyment of such rights to amount to de facto statelessness would lead to some odd consequences, particularly should a partial denial rather than a complete denial of rights be sufficient for a national to qualify as de facto stateless. For example, the Human Rights Committee has held that the right to leave any country, including one’s own, as provided for in Article 12 of the ICCPR, implies the right to be issued a passport by one’s State of nationality.127 However, should a person be unlawfully denied a passport to travel abroad, but nevertheless be able to vote in national elections, it would seem strange to say that he or she is de facto stateless. Similarly, until 1971 women were denied the right to vote in federal elections in Switzerland, but neither they nor anybody else considered that they were therefore de facto stateless. Even in a dictatorship where, say, all nationals except for one ethnic group are denied the right to a passport, the right to vote, the right to take part in public affairs and the right of access to public service,128 it is still not clear why such second-class nationals should be considered de facto “stateless”. The argument that persons who do not enjoy the rights attached to their nationality are de facto stateless appears to be based on the following premises: 127 128 education, pensions, voting, passports and medical and financial services. See further Human Rights Watch, “Egypt: Prohibited Identities: State Interference with Religious Freedom”, November 2007. See Human Rights Committee, “General Comment No. 27: Freedom of Movement”, footnote 116 above, para. 9: “In order to enable the individual to enjoy the rights guaranteed by article 12, paragraph 2, obligations are imposed both on the State of residence and on the State of nationality. Since international travel usually requires appropriate documents, in particular a passport, the right to leave a country must include the right to obtain the necessary travel documents. The issuing of passports is normally incumbent on the State of nationality of the individual. The refusal by a State to issue a passport or prolong its validity for a national residing abroad may deprive this person of the right to leave the country of residence and to travel elsewhere. It is no justification for the State to claim that its national would be able to return to its territory without a passport.” See references to the ICCPR above. See also, for example, Commission on Human Security, “Human Security Now”, New York, 2003, p. 31: “Citizenship can … be ineffective. Many countries have degrees of citizenship, giving more or fewer rights to ethnic or religious minority communities, creating inequalities that lead to grievances and possibly conflict. The objective of these discriminatory policies is to exclude communities from political, social and economic power.” 37