Joint Submission to the Human Rights Council at the 39th Session of the Universal Periodic Review. ESWATINI Introduction 1. The Coordinating Assembly of Non-Governmental Organizations (Eswatini), Youth Sustainable Development Centre, Southern African Human Rights Defenders Network, Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights and Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion make this joint submission to the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), on the right to a nationality and human rights challenges pertaining to statelessness in Eswatini. 2. This submission focuses on: I. II. III. Gender Discrimination in National Laws and Women’s Equal Rights; The Child’s Right to Nationality; and Sexual Violence and Abuse against Children and Adolescent Girls. 3. The Coordinating Assembly of Non-Governmental Organisations (CANGO) is a membership based, umbrella organisation for NGOs in Eswatini with a membership of more than seventy NGOs. Its mandate is to coordinate, facilitate joint advocacy, build capacity – both institutional and technical and manage grants. The member organisations are clustered into consortia; namely children, youth, gender, food security and livelihoods, media, HIV/AIDS, Human Rights and Governance, and the Elections Support Network. 4. Youth Sustainable Development Centre (YSDC) is a non-profit organisation that is working on youth economic empowerment through sustainable development, which further mobilises youth as sustainable development agents, problem solvers and human rights advocates. 5. The Southern African Human Rights Defenders Network (SAHRDN) is the regional human rights defenders (HRD) network with the primary mandate to coordinate the protection and security of HRDs in the region, and to enhance their ability to work in their particular countries, in the face of state-driven or supported repression. The SAHRDN supports HRDs in engaging with supranational reporting and protection mechanisms. 6. The Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights (GCENR) mobilises international action for the removal of gender-discriminatory provisions from all nationality laws, through its coalition of over twenty national, regional and international organisations and activists, including steering committee members Equality Now, Equal Rights Trust, Institute on 1