RISING STATELESSNESS DUE TO DISAPPEARING ISLAND STATES: DOES THE CURRENT STATUS OF INTERNATIONAL LAW OFFER SUFFICIENT PROTECTION? MARIJA DOBRIĆ * Scientific prognoses have shown that by the year 2100, several low-lying island states such as Tuvalu and Kiribati will disappear due to rising sea levels. The submergence of whole territories will have consequences including the displacement of a huge number of islanders. In that context, the question of how to protect their human rights in their future host states is of great importance. In fact, their human rights protection will most likely prove even more difficult if disappearing island states are considered to have lost statehood. Without the nationality of any state, those displaced islanders will be stateless under international law. In this article, the author assesses whether displaced island populations are sufficiently protected by existing international law norms or whether the international community is called upon to create new rules addressing these future challenges. TABLE OF CONTENTS I II III IV V VI Introduction............................................................................................................. 42 Statelessness — The Definition Dilemma .............................................................. 45 The Importance of Having a Nationality ................................................................ 47 The Right to Nationality ......................................................................................... 49 Loss of Nationality on the Example of Disappearing Island States ........................ 52 A Continuing Statehood of Disappearing Island States?................................ 53 B De Lege Lata Protection Possibilities for an Externally Displaced Island Population ........................................................................................ 58 1 The 1954 and 1961 Statelessness Conventions .............................. 58 2 Human Rights Treaties (ICCPR and ICESCR) .............................. 63 3 The Refugee Convention ................................................................ 64 Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 67 I INTRODUCTION As of today, many millions of people around the world are stateless. 1 Despite that large number, the protection regimes under international law that are currently in place fail to safeguard their human rights adequately. The most recent flight of the stateless Rohingya people from the territory of Myanmar and its wide coverage in * 1 Marija Dobrić was a Researcher and Lecturer at the Section for International Law and International Human Rights Law at the Bundeswehr University Munich before taking up her current position as a Judicial Clerk at the Higher Regional Court of Vienna. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, ‘Statelessness around the World’, <http://www.unhcr.org/statelessness-around-the-world.html>.