Key actions: What UNHCR and partners can do UNHCR’s approach to birth registration Invest in strengthening the civil registration system. UNHCR promotes universal, nondiscriminatory access to birth registration, and takes measures to prevent forcibly displaced and stateless children from being left behind. To achieve this goal, UNHCR works to strengthen birth registration systems to be inclusive of and respond to the specific needs of forcibly displaced and stateless children. This includes expansion of national birth registration services and their capacities in areas hosting forcibly displaced and stateless persons and addressing the barriers preventing forcibly displaced and stateless children’s birth from being registered through civil registration services. In general, UNHCR advocates that refugee children should have access to birth registration by civil registration authorities, and not by the refugee authorities. Partnership. UNHCR, other United Nations organizations, and international and national nongovernmental organizations, play an important role in supporting the development of birth registration systems that meet international standards, and working towards access to birth registration for all children. UNHCR works in close partnership on birth registration, with organizations such as UNICEF, as well as civil society organizations, including forcibly displaced and stateless-led organizations. UNHCR also works in close collaboration with human rights treaty bodies, including the Committee on the Rights of the Child and Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, as well as the Universal Periodic Review. 20 Legal and policy reforms • Advocate for laws, policies and procedures that ensure universal birth registration for all persons under the jurisdiction of a State. Advocate for non-discriminatory access to birth registration, irrespective of the parents’ nationality or lack thereof, immigration or residency status, or internal displacement within the country. • Assess gaps in laws and policies and identify barriers for forcibly displaced and stateless children to be registered at birth and for older children, adolescents, and adults, particularly among forcibly displaced and stateless persons, to access late or delayed birth registration. • Advocate for equal rights for women and men to register their children, and removal of discriminatory provisions that prevent women from registering a birth (for example, when a child is born out of wedlock, or there is a requirement for both parents to be present to register the birth). • Support Governments in civil registration reforms to simplify and streamline birth registration processes,20 for instance by issuing birth certificates immediately upon registration (e.g. allowing local birth registrars to issue birth certificates), integrating birth notification and birth certification procedures, and decentralizing services. UNDESA, “Guidelines on the legislative framework for civil registration,” (New York, United Nations, 2023), para. 34. Birth registration of forcibly displaced and stateless persons 13