example is freedom of association, which is guaranteed under the 1954 Convention’s Article 15 only to the extent it is non-political and non-profit-making, and only if stateless persons are lawfully staying on the territory of the state; it needs to be protected only to the extent that other foreigners’ right to freedom of association is protected. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights guarantees freedom of association to everyone without restrictions on the type of association, and without explicitly limiting it to those with a legal residence.10 In 2014 UNHCR clarified the protection regime for stateless persons in light of the subsequent developments in international law in its Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons. 9. Due to these subsequent developments in international human rights law, the 1954 Convention cannot be applied to contemporary situations of statelessness in isolation from the more recent human rights norms, which have the effect of supplementing the list of rights stateless persons are entitled to, and simplifying some of the 1954 Convention’s complexities. 2. Unique rights of the 1954 Convention 10. There are, however, certain unique rights guaranteed in the 1954 Convention, which are important to stateless persons and cannot be derived from other human rights treaties of more general application.11 These are, for example, the right to identity documents for stateless persons,12 the right to travel documents for stateless persons who have a residence permit in the host state (art. 28), the protection against expulsion of legally residing stateless persons (art. 31), and the right to administrative assistance of the type that other foreigners would normally be able to obtain from the state of their nationality (art. 25). A crucial principle enshrined in the 1954 Convention is that, in access to the Convention rights, no requirements can be imposed on stateless persons which they cannot comply with due to being stateless (art.6). This principle seems almost too obvious to be mentioned, as not applying it would invalidate the rights enshrined in the Convention, but in practice stateless persons are often required to comply with (often bureaucratic) requirements which they cannot fulfil because of not having nationality.13 Such requirements do not necessarily intend to discriminate against the stateless, but are simply the result of an assumption that everyone has a nationality which can provide its nationals with basic documentation. 10 UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1966, art. 22. This article is not absolute, and can be limited, specifically if the restrictions are ‘prescribed by law and […] necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public safety, public order […], the protection of public health or morals or the protection of the rights and freedoms of others’. 11 See the UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons (Geneva 2014), para 143. See also K. Bianchini, The Implementation of the Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons: Procedures and Practice in Selected EU States, PhD thesis defended at the University of York, UK, in April 2015, p. 69, pp. 71-75; L. van Waas, Nationality Matters. Statelessness under International Law, (Intersentia 2008), pp. 359-387. 12 1954 Convention relating to Status of Stateless Persons, art. 27. Some states that have acceded to the 1954 Convention made a reservation regarding the right to identity documents, among which Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Latvia, and Moldova. 13 The Dutch Committee for Migration Affairs, for example, relied on this Convention provision to argue that Dutch administrative procedures for registering statelessness where in tension with the Dutch international obligations under the 1954 Convention, since stateless persons were required to provide documentation which they were unable to obtain by virtue of being stateless. See Adviescommissie Vreemdelingenzaken (Dutch Advisory Committee on Migration Affairs), Geen land te bekennen. Een advies over de verdragsrechtelijke bescherming van staatlozen in Nederland, (December 2013) [available only in Dutch], p. 72. 5