Saint Lucia is not a party to either the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons or the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. No official data is available on stateless people in the country and little information is available on statelessness. Proposed recommendations: 1. Conduct and make publicly available, mapping studies and data collection on statelessness in the country; 2. Accede the 1954 and 1961 Conventions and take all steps necessary to implements them. Oman Oman is not a party to either the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons or the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. No official data is available on stateless people in the country. Women can only confer nationality to children if the father was Omani but subsequently became stateless or if the father is unknown. Further, women cannot confer nationality to their spouses.11 Omani citizenship can be deprived if a person joins a group or party or organisation supporting principles or beliefs that harm the interests of Oman. Safeguards to prevent arbitrary deprivation of nationality and statelessness are not in place while the relevant authority has broad discretionary powers to strip people of their Omani nationality. Proposed recommendation: 1. Amend Oman’s nationality laws to eradicate gender discrimination by allowing women to confer their nationality onto their children and spouses; 2. Amend Oman’s nationality laws to ensure that nobody can be deprived of Omani nationality; 3. Accede the 1954 and 1961 Conventions and take all steps necessary to implements them. Austria Austria is a party to both the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. According to UNHCR, there were 4,099 stateless people in the country in 2025. 12 Austria lacks a definition of a stateless person and a procedure to determine statelessness in domestic law, although there are other administrative procedures through which statelessness may be identified. However, none of these lead to legal residence status. On the prevention and reduction of statelessness, Austrian law establishes some partial safeguards. Foundlings only acquire Austrian nationality up to the age of six months and jus sanguinis provisions for children born to Austrian nationals abroad are discriminatory.13 Proposed recommendations: 1. Establish a clear and predictable statelessness determination procedure that guarantees basic procedural rights and safeguards; 2. Provide access to nationality to all children regardless of their parents’ status. Australia Australia is a party to both the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. According to UNHCR, there were 7,503 stateless people in the country in 2025. 14 Australia lacks legal safeguards against childhood statelessness. Australian citizenship law requires children to prove that not only are they not a national or citizens of any other country but that they have never been and are not entitled to nationality or citizenship of another country. Administrative barriers still exist as refugees and people seeking asylum may have no documents or documents that Australia accepts. For example, a birth certificate is required as supporting evidence for acquiring citizenship.15 11 Global Campaign for Equal nationality Rights, ‘Middle East and North Africa’, available at: https://www.equalnationalityrights.org/middle-east-north-africa/. 12 UNHCR, ‘Global trends’, available at: https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/insights/annexes/trends-annexes.html?situation=4. 13 European Network on Statelessness, ‘Statelessness Index: Georgia’, available at: https://index.statelessness.eu/. 14 Ibid. 15 Nationality for All, ‘Statelessness Encyclopaedia Asia Pacific’, available at: https://nationalityforall.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/SEAP-Report- 2024Detailed-Version.pdf. 4