Spain’s Universal Periodic Review under 8th (2010) and 21st sessions (2015) 6. Spain’s human rights record was reviewed by the United Nations Human Rights Council during the 8th and 21st UPR sessions, in 2010 and 2015 respectively. In the First Cycle, Spain did not receive any recommendations relating to statelessness or nationality, whereas during the Second Cycle Ecuador, Azerbaijan, Paraguay and Portugal recommended that Spain accede to the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.4 In addition, Spain received nine recommendations on detention, of which it supported seven.5 Spain’s International Obligations 7. Spain is party to the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons (1954 Convention), to which it acceded in 19976, and to the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness (1961 Convention), to which it acceded in 2018,7 following the aforementioned recommendations during the Second Cycle of the UPR. 8. In relation to the 1954 Convention, Spain made a reservation to “article 29, paragraph 1, [on fiscal charges upon stateless persons] and considers itself bound by the provisions of that paragraph only in the case of stateless persons residing in the territory of any of the Contracting States”. 9. In relation to the 1961 Convention, Spain made declarations on the “local nature of the authorities of Gibraltar”, and in relation to deprivation of nationality, stating that “under article 8 (3) (a), the Government of Spain declares that it reserves the right to deprive a person of Spanish nationality when he enters voluntarily the service of the armed forces, or holds political office, in a foreign State against the express prohibition of the Government.” 10. Apart from the aforementioned statelessness conventions, Spain is bound by fundamental human rights treaties pertaining to the prevention of statelessness and the protection of stateless persons which work as essential international mechanisms for ensuring the right to a nationality and protecting the rights of stateless persons, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Arts. 7 and 8), International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (Art. 24.3), International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (Art 5(d)(iii)), Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (Art. 9), and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (Art. 18) . However, on a regional level, Spain is not a party to the 1997 European Convention on Nationality (ECN) nor to the 2006 Convention of the Council of Europe on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession. 11. All the above treaties are part of Spain’s national law. Article 96 of the Spanish Constitution states that “validly concluded international treaties once officially published in Spain, shall be part of the internal legal system”8. Therefore, they are incorporated into national law without the need for 4 UN Human Rights Council, Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review: Spain, 13 April 2015, A/HRC/29/8, paras. 131.4 and 131.9, available at: http://cort.as/-Kz5n [accessed 8 July 2019]. 5 UN Human Rights Council, Addendum: Views on Conclusions and/or Recommendations, Voluntary Commitments and Replies Presented by the State Under Review, 2 November 2015, A/HRC/29/8/Add.1/Corr.1, available at: http://cort.as/Kz5o [accessed 8 July 2019]. 6 UN General Assembly, Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, 28 September 1954, United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 360, p. 117, available at: http://cort.as/-Kz5q [accessed 8 July 2019]. 7 UN General Assembly, Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, 30 August 1961, United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 989, p. 175, available at: http://cort.as/-Kz5t [accessed 8 July 2019]. 8 Spanish Constitution (1978): http://cort.as/4DRJ [accessed 8 July 2019]. 2