2019 Statelessness & Citizenship Review 1(2) TWO ‘INVISIBLE’ HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS, INDIVIDUALLY AND TOGETHER At least 15 million people are estimated to be stateless around the world, 1 not considered nationals by any state under the operation of its laws according to the 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons (‘1954 Convention’). 2 Yet attention to this issue has not necessarily matched the problem’s scale, as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has described stateless persons as ‘“invisible,” frequently living at the margins of society and the economy’. 3 And while this is a critical human rights issue in itself, the violation of the right to a nationality is not the only rights abuse that stateless persons face. Due to the interrelated and interdependent nature of human rights, statelessness can be the cause and consequence of other rights violations, including civil and political rights and socioeconomic and cultural rights. Existing research on the rights violations faced by stateless persons has largely focused on civil and political rights, such as the right to move freely, participate politically and the constant threat and real peril of indefinite arbitrary detention. 4 While some have considered the socioeconomic rights of stateless persons, these discussions are often limited. Rights violations are often wideranging and thus rarely analysed in great detail, instead referred to in general terms about the discrimination stateless persons face ‘accessing basic rights’.5 The barriers stateless children face in enjoying the right to education and the resulting impact this has on their futures is one of the few socioeconomic rights analysed in greater depth, 6 as are the obstacles faced by stateless persons with regards to accessing medical care and enjoying the right to the highest attainable standard of health. 7 The intersection of other socioeconomic rights and statelessness, such as the right to adequate housing, has not received the same level of consideration thus far. This analysis attempts to fill that void by highlighting the unique challenges faced by stateless persons in the enjoyment of the right to adequate housing. Through this examination, the author hopes to call attention to this human rights violation and prompt further investigation, which may ultimately result in greater respect and protection of the rights of stateless persons. At the same time that millions are denied the right to a nationality, the United Nations estimates that over one billion people worldwide are not adequately 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, ‘Executive Summary’ in The World’s Stateless (Wolf Legal Publishers 2014) 11. Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, opened for signature 28 September 1954, 360 UNTS 117 (entered into force 6 June 1960) (‘1954 Convention’). United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR Global Report 2007 (Annual Report, 2007) 39. See, eg, Amal de Chickera and Nina Murray, Protecting Stateless Persons from Arbitrary Detention: An Agenda for Change (Report, European Network on Statelessness, 4 May 2017) 8. Michelle Foster and Hélène Lambert, ‘Statelessness as a Human Rights Issue: A Concept Whose Time Has Come’ (2016) 28(4) International Journal of Refugee Law 564, 567. Hernan Vales, ‘Human Rights and Stateless Children’ in Laura van Waas and Amal de Chickera (eds), The World’s Stateless: Children (Wolf Legal Publishers 2017) 163. Lindsey Kingston, Elizabeth Cohen and Christopher Morley, ‘Debate: Limitations on Universality: The “Right to Health” and the Necessity of Legal Nationality’ (2010) 10(11) BMC International Health and Human Rights <https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2894754/>. 240