THEMATIC BRIEFING | JULY 2021
Deprivation of nationality and the prevention of statelessness in Europe
17
REFERENCES
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
Available at: https://www.statelessness.eu/
Principles on Deprivation of Nationality as a National Security Measure, March 2020, available at: https://files.institutesi.
org/PRINCIPLES.pdf. The Principles were drafted by the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion (ISI) in collaboration
with the Open Society Justice Initiative and with support from the Asser Institute and Ashurst LLP. They have been
endorsed by over 100 individual experts and organisations, including leading academics, UN Special Rapporteurs and
Treaty Body members, litigators, judges, parliamentarians, and diplomats. The Principles restate or reflect international
law and legal standards under the UN Charter, treaty law, customary international law, general principles of law, judicial
decisions and legal scholarship, regional and national law and practice. They articulate the international law obligations
of States and apply to all situations in which States take or consider taking steps to deprive a person of nationality as a
national security measure.
UN Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, 28 September 1954, Article 1(1).
UNHCR Handbook on Protection of Stateless Persons Under the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless
Persons, Geneva (2014), para. 23: https://www.unhcr.org/dach/wp-content/uploads/sites/27/2017/04/CH-UNHCR_
Handbook-on-Protection-of-Stateless-Persons.pdf.
Human Rights Council (HRC), ‘Human Rights and arbitrary deprivation of nationality: Report of the Secretary-General’, A/
HRC/19/43 (2011).
See also the American Convention on Human Rights (AHCR) (Article 20); the Arab Charter on Human Rights (Article
24); the Covenant on the Rights of the Child in Islam (Article 7); the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Declaration (paragraph 18); and the Commonwealth of Independent States Convention on Human Rights and
Fundamental Freedoms (Article 24).
See Involuntary Loss of European Citizenship (ILEC), Guidelines Involuntary Loss of European Citizenship (2015).
For an exhaustive list of international standards on nationality law, see: de Groot, G.R and Vonk, O. W (2016).
International Standards on Nationality Law. Texts, Cases and Materials. Oisterwijk: Wolf Legal Publishers
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia,
Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, and Spain.
Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Moldova,
Netherlands, North Macedonia, Portugal, Serbia, Spain, UK, Ukraine, and Norway.
State parties: Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Moldova, Netherlands, North Macedonia,
Portugal, Ukraine, and Norway. Signed but not acceded: Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Malta, and Poland.
See Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, ‘The World’s Stateless 2020: Deprivation of Nationality’, (2020); Jules
Lepoutre, ‘Citizenship Loss and Deprivation in the European Union (27+1), EUI Working Paper RSCAS 2020/29, Robert
Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, Global Governance Programme-392, GLOBALCIT (2020); Emilien Fargues, Iseult
Honohan, ‘Revocation of Citizenship: The New Policies of Conditional Membership’, EUI Working Paper RSC 2021/23,
Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, Global Governance Programme-438, GLOBALCIT (2021).
German law on deprivation of nationality changed in 2019. The law now permits deprivation of nationality on national
security grounds, which may affect how Germany is assessed in the Statelessness Index in the future.
The duty to avoid statelessness is a ‘fundamental principle of international law’, UN Human Rights Council (HRC),
‘Human rights and arbitrary deprivation of nationality: Report of the Secretary-General’, A/HRC/25/28 (2013), p. 3;
Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, ‘Commentary to the Principles on Deprivation of Nationality As a National
Security Measure’, (2020), pp. 92, para 33-40; European Convention on Nationality (ECN) 1997, Article 4(b); UN
Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness 1961, Article 7(6).
Explanatory Report to the ECN, 1997, pp. 23, para 33; see also International Law Commission, ‘Fourth report on the
expulsion of aliens, by Mr. Maurice Kamto, Special Rapporteur, A/CN.4/594 (24 March 2008) para 29.
1961 Convention, Article 8.2.b; and ECN, Article 7.3.
UN Human Rights Council (HRC), ‘Human rights and arbitrary deprivation of nationality: Report of the SecretaryGeneral’, A/HRC/25/28 (2013), para 12.
Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, North Macedonia, Poland, Portugal, Serbia and Slovenia.
Albania, Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Malta, Moldova, Netherlands,
Spain, Switzerland, UK, Ukraine, and Norway.
See for example: Fargues E. (2019) Simply a matter of compliance with the rules? The moralising and responsibilising
function of fraud-based citizenship deprivation in France and the UK. Citizenship Studies 23: 356 - 371.
Lepoutre (2020), op.cit 12, p.22
UNHCR, Expert Meeting - Interpreting the 1961 Statelessness Convention and Avoiding Statelessness resulting from