the broader context of discrimination and vulnerability of the stateless person in a particular country, particularly if this has been going on for many years; in cases involving children it relies on the Convention on the Rights of the Child in order to give further content to the right to nationality. This is a welcome application of the principle of indivisibility of rights by the Court. According to this principle, no human right can be fully realized without the full realization of all other human rights. In other words, ‘states cannot pick and choose among rights’.130 For the Inter-American Court, the realization of each human right imposes a tri-partite obligation on states: to respect, protect and fulfill. A violation of any of these would entail states’ international responsibility, and a duty of reparation ranging from recognition of nationality to the payment of compensation for the damage sustained, and even an act of apology. 3.2 The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights and the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child The 1981 African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) does not include an explicit provision on the right to a nationality. However, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has held the right to a nationality to be a key component of the African human rights system. It has ruled that Article 5 of the ACHPR, which states that ‘Every individual shall have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being and to the recognition of his legal status’, includes the right to a nationality and protection against arbitrary deprivation of nationality. 131 The Commission has held that the due process protections included in the African Charter apply to everyone, including non-nationals.132 The Commission has also ruled in several cases that mass expulsions on the basis of ethnicity, specifically prohibited by Article 12(5) of the ACHPR, ‘constitute a special violation of human rights’.133 In addition, Article 6 of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child provides for the right of children to a name, to be registered immediately after birth and to acquire a nationality. It requires States: to ensure that their Constitutional legislation recognize the principles according to which a child shall acquire the nationality of the State in the territory of which he has been born if, at the time of the child’s birth, he is not granted nationality by any other State in accordance with its laws. James W. Nickel, ‘Rethinking Indivisibility: Towards A Theory of Supporting Relations between Human Rights’, Human Rights Quarterly 30 (2008) 984-1001, arguing that rights with low quality implementation provide little support to other rights; for indivisibility to work, the rights in question must be fully realized (at 984). 131 African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, 234: Resolution on the Right to Nationality, 23 April 2013 available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/51adbcd24.html [accessed 23 July 2013] 132 Union Inter-Africaine des Droits de l’Homme, Fédération Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l’Homme and Others v. Angola, African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, Comm. No. 159/96 (1997), para.18 – available at: www1.umn.edu/humanrts/africa/comcases/159-96.html (last accessed 23 July 2013). 133 Union Inter-Africaine des Droits de l’Homme, Fédération Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l’Homme and Others v. Angola, African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, Comm. No. 159/96 (1997), para.16 – available at: www1.umn.edu/humanrts/africa/comcases/159-96.html (last accessed 23 July 2013). 130 22