status if they had no prior right to stay. Legal doctrine and practice have, however, interpreted Article 31(1) FNA as not requiring a person applying for statelessness status to have entered the country legally or to have some form of residence permit.58 If a person is recognised as stateless, that person is granted a right to remain and has the right to freedom of movement within the entire Swiss territory. This practice is consistent with UNHCR’s interpretation of the 1954 Convention according to which ‘there is no basis in the Convention for requiring that applicants for statelessness determination be lawfully within a State’.59 If a person is recognised as stateless, that person should be granted a residence permit in order to fulfil the object and purpose of the 1954 Convention.60 23. The failure to recognise statelessness as a protection issue and the lack of a dedicated statelessness determination procedure also has the consequence that applicants are not granted a special temporary status during the procedure. This is a gap in the legal framework that exposes stateless persons to particular risks, including the risk of arbitrary detention, destitution and possibly attempted removal during a pending decision on the recognition of statelessness.61 In order to avoid violations of the rights of stateless persons, applicants should not be removed during a determination procedure and instead be granted a temporary legal status, in compliance with the guidance provided in the UNHCR Handbook.62 At a minimum, persons applying for statelessness recognition should be issued an identity paper and be granted assistance to meet basic needs, as well as the right to work, freedom of movement and protection against expulsion and arbitrary detention. Ideally, applicants should be offered the same standard of treatment as asylum-seekers.63 The Right of Every Child to Acquire a Nationality 24. Article 7(1) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and Article 24(3) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights guarantee that every child has the right to acquire a nationality. Article 7(2) CRC requires that state parties ‘ensure the implementation of these rights in accordance with their national law and their obligations under the relevant international instruments in this field, in particular where the child would otherwise be stateless’. Stateless children are vulnerable to discrimination, in particular with regard to access to education, health and assistance, and face the risk of serious human rights violations. 25. The right of the child to acquire a nationality must be implemented in accordance with the general principles of the CRC, including the right to non-discrimination and the best interest of the child.64 Articles 3 and 7 of the CRC require that no child should be left stateless for an extended period of time, but should be granted the right to acquire a nationality at birth or as soon as possible after birth.65 26. Swiss nationality law does not protect against statelessness at birth. In accordance with the principle of ius sanguinis Swiss citizenship is acquired at birth if the parents are Swiss citizens. If a child is born to 58 Karen Hamann, Statelessness determination: the Swiss experience, Forced Migration Review 54, February 2017, available at: http://www.fmreview.org/resettlement/hamann.html, p. 97. 59 UNHCR, Statelessness Handbook (note 12), para 69. 60 Ibid, para 147. 61 See also Karen Hamann (note 58), p. 98. 62 UNHCR, Statelessness Handbook (note 12), paras 72, 145 and 146. 63 Ibid, paras 145 and 146. 64 Articles 2 and 3 Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989. 65 UNHCR, Guidelines on Statelessness No. 4: Ensuring Every Child’s Right to Acquire a Nationality through Articles 1-4 of the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, 21 December 2012, HCR/GS/12/04, available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/50d460c72.html, para 11. See also PACE Resolution 1989 (2014) (note 51), para 5.2.7; PACE, Resolution 2099 (2016) (note 51), para 12.2.2. 9