MK (A Child By Her Litigation Friend CAE), R (On the Application O... 6 of 12 http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2017/1365.html definition in the [1954] Convention, he or she would have had to apply to those states which might consider her to be and might accept her as a national. … I was left with the suspicion … that the petitioner did not wish to attempt to obtain the nationality of either [Russia or Ukraine] lest that diminished her chances of remaining within the United Kingdom. … [M]y view, looking at the definition in the Convention, [is] that before a person can be regarded as stateless she must have made application to those countries with which she has closest connection. In the result, I am not prepared on such meagre information as I was provided with, to find that the petitioner is a stateless person." 19. All the authorities on this line of argument to which I was specifically referred are to the same effect, and I was indeed told that the parties agreed that it was appropriate to apply the principles set out in KK. Mr Brown's position was that the application of those principles showed that C was not stateless as she has and had always been able in practice to acquire Indian nationality; Mr Burrett argued that the need for registration, or the need for the permission of the Central Government, or the specific documentary requirements for registration, or some combination of one or more of those factors, took the case into the third KK category and that accordingly C should be treated as not having Indian nationality. 20. Applying those principles to Indian law as I have found it to be would lead to the dismissal of this claim. There is no doubt that registration of a child under one year old is a purely administrative matter, and Indian citizenship is a matter of entitlement. The child would therefore fall to be considered an Indian national at that stage. Whatever might be said about the requirement for permission after the child's first birthday, that would prevent the child from being able to meet the requirements of paragraph 3(1)(a) that 'he … always has been stateless'. As I have found, however, the requirement for permission does not in practice mean that registration after the child's first birthday is discretionary, so an older child would not be able to show that 'he is … stateless' as required by the same subparagraph. 21. That, however, is not the end of the matter. The authorities to which I have so far referred are all of the Upper Tribunal or of this Court or its equivalent, although some of them apply dicta of the Court of Appeal in refugee cases. But I am also referred to two decisions of the Supreme Court that in my judgment have clear bearing on this issue, Al-Jeddah v SSHD [2013] UKSC 62 and Pham v SSHD [2015] UKSC 19. 22. Both appeals were concerned with the meaning and operation of s 40(4) of the British Nationality Act 1981. By s 40(2) the Secretary of State may deprive a person of 'citizenship status' if she is satisfied that deprivation is conducive to the public good; but by s 40(4): "The Secretary of State may not make an order under subsection (2) if he is satisfied that the order would make a person stateless." 23. Al-Jeddah was of Iraqi origin and had Iraqi nationality by descent. He later acquired British citizenship, and so lost his Iraqi nationality. The Secretary of State made her order depriving him of British citizenship on 14 December 2007. He claimed that the order was invalidated by s 40(4). At the invitation of the Secretary of State the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court (the latter with considerable hesitation) determined the issue on the factual premise that on the date of the order AlJeddah had a right to immediate restoration of his Iraqi nationality on application to the Iraqi authorities. (The reason for the Supreme Court's hesitation was that that does not appear to have been the actual effect of the relevant Iraqi law.) The Secretary of State's position was that in these circumstances the order did not 'make' Al-Jeddah stateless: what made (or might make) him stateless was his failure to apply for the restoration of his Iraqi nationality 24. That argument found no favour with the Court of Appeal [2012] EWCA Civ 358. In his judgment, Richards LJ said this: 20/05/2021, 15:49