Merve Erdilmen and Iseult Honohan 7. Observations and Recommendations 1. Statelessness has become one of the most salient global issues with more than 10 million stateless people – of which one third are children – around the world.13 (It has been estimated that in 2018 roughly 400,000 of these are in Europe.)14 A higher proportion of EU Member States than in most other regions of the world have some provisions for granting citizenship to children born in the country who would otherwise be stateless. But fully adequate protection against statelessness requires that ius soli citizenship be provided in all countries at birth for stateless children in accordance with the provisions of the 1961 United Nations Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.15 Thus, Cyprus and Romania should take steps toward introducing ius soli provisions for otherwise stateless children. Statelessness may arise also not only where parents are stateless, but where they may not be able to transmit their citizenship to their child. Thus, other Member States that provide for citizenship only where parents are stateless, require other conditions, or delay the grant of citizenship, should review this to include all children who would otherwise be stateless. 2. While it is of primary concern to prevent statelessness, so that every person has a citizenship, it is also important that people can acquire citizenship in the specific country where they live. Not only economic and social rights, but also citizenship and political rights are significant pillars of immigrants’ pathway to integration. Naturalisation is only one way of achieving this. The provision of citizenship on the basis of general modes of ius soli has been found to promote the integration of immigrants. This calls for more extensive ius soli provisions at birth for second and third generations. Although more EU Member States have recently introduced elements of ius soli to their citizenship laws, so that 22 EU Member States have some provision for citizenship to children born to non-citizens, many of these are in very restricted forms. We have seen that most provide for only for stateless and foundlings. In addition to Cyprus (which provides for neither) and Romania (which provides only for foundlings), another 16 EU Member States have no general provision for ius soli at birth, although 9 of these (and Romania) do have some provision for ius soli acquisition after birth. Following the examples of Germany (2000) and Portugal (2006, 2019), other states should introduce some more general provisions for ius soli citizenship at birth. There also is scope for more countries to follow the initiatives taken in Greece and Luxembourg that have broadened its availability on the basis of residence and education after birth, and introduced double ius soli respectively. Even without ius soli, more countries could also introduce the kind of provision for socialisation-based acquisition through declaration found in Sweden, rather than through the variety of more discretionary processes that many involve. Discretionary processes of naturalisation or onerous procedures should not be required for those who have spent almost all their lives since birth in the country. 13 UNHCR. (2019). “Statelessness around the World”. Last accessed at: https://www.unhcr.org/statelessnessaround-the-world.html , January 2, 2020 14 European Migration Network (2020). “Statelessness in the European Union”. Last accessed at: https://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/sites/homeaffairs/files/00_eu_inform_statelessness_en.pdf , February 19, 2020. 15 The 1961 United Nations Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness (Article 1 and Article 3) requires states to grant citizenship to children who are otherwise stateless at birth either automatically at birth or upon application. RSCAS/GLOBALCIT-Comp. 2020/2 - © 2020 Authors 11