The President of Somalia signed the National Identification and Registration Authority Bill on 20 March. The law will set up a new National Identity Management System and sets the conditions for legal identity documents to be issued to nationals of the Federal Republic of Somalia. According to the law, every Somali citizen will be able to register their identity and obtain a national ID card. The signed law will be published in the official gazette, after which it will come into effect. In Yemen, UNHCR supported more than 860 persons at risk of statelessness to access national ID cards and other identification documents. In Mozambique, UNHCR and the Catholic University of Mozambique, in collaboration with Government authorities in Pemba, assisted a total of 1,172 people to reacquire birth certificates and national IDs, which have been lost during displacement. Action 10: Improve quantitative and qualitative data on stateless populations The Russian Federation published the results of the 2020 population census in January, which showed that the number of people who declared themselves stateless had decreased to 95,193 compared to 178,000 in the 2010 census. The census data is available with a breakdown by age, gender, and region of residence. Mobilizing governments and civil society UNHCR, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), and the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) held a regional meeting of government statelessness focal points and civil society from West and Central Africa from 27 to 30 March in Saly, Senegal. The meeting resulted in the adoption at technical level of a regional model law on statelessness determination, the protection of stateless persons and the facilitation of their naturalization. ECOWAS and ECCAS presented their roadmaps to move the model Law forward in their respective communities. The meeting also included a stocktaking of progress made towards implementing pledges, challenges faced, and opportunities for redoubled efforts to address statelessness. In Kazakhstan, UNHCR and the Migration Service Committee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs signed a joint work plan for 2023 to address statelessness. The plan details various joint activities to enhance the legal framework for the protection of stateless people and to reduce and prevent statelessness. One key action involves harmonizing national legislation with the 1954 and 1961 Statelessness Conventions. The Ministry of Interior of Iraq and UNHCR jointly organized a Statelessness Conference in Baghdad on 18 January. The conference was attended by high-level officials from the government, donor community, UN agencies, civil society organizations, and affected population. The aim of the conference was to mobilize support to identify solutions to end statelessness for the remaining stateless population, prevent future instances of statelessness through legal reform, and scale up nationwide efforts to enable access to civil documentation. To further engage relevant stakeholders, UNHCR conducted a workshop on statelessness in Erbil on 22 January, involving national and international NGOs, civil society, and academia. A press release on the Statelessness Conference can be found here and videos in English here and in Arabic here. With the deactivation of the Protection Cluster in Iraq at the end of 2022, a Protection Platform, coled by UNHCR and OHCHR, was set up in October 2022. Participants include other UN entities and NGO representatives. The Protection Platform aims to coordinate high-level advocacy and provide guidance to partners, particularly under the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation UNHCR > The Campaign to End Statelessness | January – March 2023 Update 6