Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights and
Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion
Joint Submission to the Human Rights Council at the 29th Session of
the Universal Periodic Review
Barbados
Introduction
1. The Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights and the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion
make this joint submission to the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) in relation to gender
discrimination in the nationality law of Barbados and related statelessness and human rights
challenges.
2. The Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights mobilises international action for the removal
of gender discriminatory provisions from all nationality laws through its coalition of national and
international organisations and activists.1
3. The Institute2 is an independent non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting an integrated,
human rights based response to the injustice of statelessness and exclusion. Established in August
2014, it is the first and only global centre committed to promoting the human rights of stateless
persons and ending statelessness. Over the past two years, the Institute has made over 15 country
specific UPR submissions on the human rights of stateless persons, and also compiled summaries
of the key human rights challenges related to statelessness in all countries under the 23rd to the
28th UPR Sessions.3
4. This submission focuses on:
I.
II.
III.
The right of married women to confer nationality on children and spouses, without
discrimination on the basis of sex;
The right of single men to confer nationality on children, without discrimination on the
basis of sex;
Human rights violations resulting from gender discrimination in the nationality law of
Barbados.
5. This Submission draws on experience with research, advocacy, and awareness raising of the cosubmitting organisations and their partners. This includes the recent joint submission by the cosubmitters to the Committee on the Rights of the Child, which reviewed Barbados on 17 and 18
January 2017 during the 74th Session of the Committee4 and the Committee on the Elimination of
1
For more information see www.equalnationalityrights.org
For more information see http://institutesi.org/
3 For more on the Institute’s UPR advocacy, see http://www.institutesi.org/ourwork/humanrights.php.
4 The Global Campaign, ISI joint submission to the CRC can be accessed here:
2