Chapter 2. Europe and Statelessness Only a few years before the outbreak of World War II, the Convention of 28 October 1933 relating to the International Status of Refugees was adopted. This instrument was aimed at ensuring that refugees could enjoy civil rights, free and ready access to the courts, security and stability as regards establishment and work, facilities in the exercise of the professions, of industry and of commerce, and in regard to the movement of people, admission to schools and universities.358 Even if this treaty does not mention statelessness explicitly anywhere in its text, the Convention was to be applied to Russian and Armenian refugees359, among whom certainly were stateless people. There were some problems with applying the Convention360, such as the inability to respond to refugees from Germany361, but the 1933 Refugee Convention was certainly an achievement – in itself and because of the standards of refugee treatment that it set.362 To respond to the situation of the German refugees, which was getting more critical363, further instruments of protection were developed: a 1936 Provisional Arrangement364 and the subsequent 1938 Convention concerning the Status of Refugees Coming from Germany.365 Article 1(1) of the 1938 Convention read as follows: For the purposes of the present Convention, the term “refugees coming from Germany” shall be deemed to apply to: (a) Persons possessing or having possessed German nationality and not possessing any other nationality who are proved not to enjoy, in law or in fact, the protection of the German Government; (b) Stateless persons not covered by previous Conventions or Agreements who have left German territory after being established therein and who are proved not to enjoy, in law or in fact, the protection of the German Government. 358 359 360 361 362 363 364 365 Convention of 28 October 1933 relating to the International Status of Refugees (adopted 28 October 1933, entered into force 13 June 1935) 159 LNTS 3663 (1933 Refugee Convention). Art 1 of the 1933 Refugee Convention. Marc Vishniak, ‘The Legal Status of Stateless Persons’ in AG Duker (ed), Pamphlet Series: Jews and the Post-War World (No. 6, American Jewish Committee 1945) 49–55. Michelle Foster & Hélène Lambert, International Refugee Law and the Protection of Stateless Persons (Oxford University Press 2019) 22. Claudena M Skran, Refugees in Inter-War Europe. The Emergence of a Regime (Clarendon Press 1995) 124–130; Peter Fitzmaurice, ‘Between the wars – The Refugee Convention of 1933: A Contemporary Analysis’ in David Keane & Yvonne McDermott (eds), The Challenge of Human Rights. Past, Present and Future (Edward Elgar 2012). See more elaborately Michelle Foster & Hélène Lambert, International Refugee Law and the Protection of Stateless Persons (Oxford University Press 2019) 22–24. Provisional Arrangement concerning the Status of Refugees coming from Germany (signed 4 July 1936) 171 LNTS 77 (No. 3952). Convention concerning the Status of Refugees coming from Germany (signed 10 February 1938) 192 LNTS 61 (No. 4461). Th is treaty was concluded between Belgium, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Denmark, Spain, France, Norway and the Netherlands, but in practice, no state wanted to welcome them. See for instance Paul R Bartrop, The Evian Conference of 1938 and the Jewish Refugee Crisis (Palgrave MacMillan 2018) 1–4. The only states that had ratified this treaty before World War II broke out, were Belgium and Great Britain (in 1939), see also David Fraser & Frank Caestecker, ‘Jews or Germans? Nationality Legislation and the Restoration of Liberal Democracy in Western Europe after the Holocaust’ (2013) 31 Law and History Review 391, 395. Intersentia 67