Critically, transitional clauses were added to the new law in order to address any existing problems. Under article 41, a child born before the entry into force of the law, whose mother is Indonesian, was given four years to register for Indonesian nationality. Similarly, under article 42, a person who lost their nationality due to long-term residence abroad under the old law could apply for reacquisition of Indonesian citizenship within three years.132 Unofficial sources reported that several hundred children of Indonesian mothers and non-national fathers were granted nationality within a few months after the new law entered into force.133 Meanwhile, several thousand migrants in Malaysia alone have successfully re-acquired their Indonesian nationality.134 In particular among this latter group, it is likely that this policy has had a significant impact in terms of reducing cases of statelessness. In Viet Nam, legal reform presented an opportunity to both reduce existing cases of statelessness and prevent new ones. There, problems stemmed from the lack of adequate safeguards under the previous law to protect women from statelessness in the context of marriage and divorce. Many women who married foreigners – principally Chinese, Korean and Taiwanese men – renounced their Vietnamese citizenship in order to apply for their husband’s nationality. If the marriage broke down before the new nationality was granted, the women were left stateless. The numbers are significant, with more than 50,000 marriages contracted between Vietnamese women and foreign men from 1995 to 2002 and up to 10% of these marriages failing. The government estimated that at least 3,000 women were rendered stateless in these circumstances.135 This is why a particular focus of the new nationality law passed in 2008 was to allow such women to have their citizenship restored.136 5.2 Citizenship campaigns Whether in the context of the adoption of a new nationality policy or as a separate initiative, states may determine that the time is right for a citizenship campaign geared specifically towards the reduction of statelessness. Such a campaign can take shape in different ways. One possibility is the large-scale naturalisation of stateless persons residing on the state’s territory, as seen in Indonesia, for instance, in addressing the situation of stateless ethnic Chinese. Following Indonesia’s independence, the citizenship status of Chinese migrants residing on Indonesian soil was unclear. Many lacked the necessary documents to establish a longstanding tie to Indonesia and claim nationality under the law. However, nor did they adopt Chinese citizenship. Later, approximately 110,000 of these persons successfully petitioned for Indonesian citizenship and were granted nationality collectively by Decree.137 Similarly, in the Philippines, successive Presidential decrees passed in the 1970s provided for the “granting of citizenship to deserving aliens”.138 The principal beneficiaries were ethnic Chinese – 132 The procedures for registration under these two clauses were set out in Regulation No. M.01.HL.03.01 of 2006 on Registration Procedures for Acquiring Indonesian Citizenship based on Article 41 and re-gaining Indonesian Citizenship based on Article 42 of the Law on Citizenship of the Republic of Indonesia, Decree No. 12, 2006 133 Dual nationality, Indonesia Matters Weblog citing information reported by Indonesia’s Justice and Human Rights Minister Hamid Awaluddin in March 2007. 134 Correspondence with UNHCR Malaysia, September 2010. 135 UNHCR, Divorce leaves some Vietnamese women broken-hearted and stateless, 14 March 2007; M. Lynch; K. Southwick, Nationality rights for all: A progress report and global survey on statelessness, Refugees International, 2009; UNHCR, Vietnam sets the pace for Asia with new law to prevent statelessness, 1 July 2009; US Department of State, 2009 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – Vietnam, 11 March 2010. 136 Article 23 (f) of the Law on Vietnamese Nationality, Order No. 22/2008/L-CTN, 2008. In order to reduce statelessness in accordance with this legal reform, the government now plans to conduct a full survey of the beneficiary population and develop an appropriate strategy for awareness-raising and legal assistance. 137 Indonesia: 100 stateless people seek Indonesian Citizenship, The Jakarta Post [Indonesia], 10 February 2001; J. Sidel, Indonesia: Minorities, migrant workers, refugees and the new citizenship law, a Writenet Report for UNHCR, March 2007; M. Lynch; K. Southwick, Nationality rights for all: A progress report and global survey on statelessness, Refugees International, 2009. 138 Presidential Decree No. 836 granting citizenship to deserving aliens and for other purposes, 3 December 1975; Presidential Decree No. 923 granting citizenship to deserving aliens and for other purposes, 20 April 1976. 20