designed to ensure continued consistency of Irish citizenship law with the State's international commitments” In July 2012, UNHCR organised a series of events on statelessness. The Head of the UNHCR Statelessness Unit in Geneva came to Ireland and met with officials from INIS and the asylum determination bodies. A seminar was held with legal practitioners and key officials in partnership with the Irish Society of International Law. Attention was drawn to the UNHCR guidelines on the definition of statelessness and on statelessness procedures, published shortly before these events, and practical assistance and advice was offered in relation to the establishment of determination procedures. “Nowhere People: The World’s Stateless”, an exhibition of the work by award-winning photographer Greg Constantine was hosted for three weeks in the Department of Justice building at 51 St. Stephen’s Green.1 In June 2013 statelessness experts from UNHCR met with officials and delivered training to around 40 officials from across the relevant State agencies.The training covered the legal framework, the definition of a stateless person, the causes and consequences of statelessness, statelessness determination procedures and the protection of stateless persons. UNHCR has very recently published a Handbook on Protection of Stateless Persons. The Handbook2 sets out guidance on interpretation and implementation of the provisions of the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons. The Handbook is intended to guide government officials, judges and practitioners, as well as UNHCR staff and others involved in addressing statelessness. The content of this Handbook was first published in 2012 in the form of three UNHCR Guidelines: (1) on the Definition of a Stateless Person, (2) on Statelessness Determination Procedures and (3) on the Status of Stateless Persons. In replacing these Guidelines, the text of the Handbook replicates their content with only minimal changes, principally to address minor gaps identified since publication of the Guidelines and to update references to other UNHCR publications. The Handbook does not include guidance on prevention and reduction of statelessness; these are dealt with instead in separate Guidelines (Guidelines on Ensuring Every Child's Right to Acquire a Nationality through Articles 1-4 of the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness 3 and forthcoming Guidelines on loss and deprivation of nationality). A Handbook for Parliamentarians on Nationality and Statelessness has also been published4. It was first issued in 2005, and was updated in August 2008; a new edition was launched in July 2014. UNHCR’s Handbooks and guidelines aim to provide a valuable resource for both stateless determination procedures and the development and implementation of law and 1 http://www.nowherepeople.org/ Available at http://www.refworld.org/docid/53b676aa4.html 3 Available at: http://refworld.org/docid/50d460c72.html 4 Available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/436608b24.html 2 Page 2 of 26