Statelessness Working Paper Series 2017/04 6.2.3. On their Knowledge of the Law The survey also underlined the lack of knowledge by civil servants of the jurisprudence related to Article 10 BNC and of access and/or knowledge of the Syrian Nationality Law. The judgments that do not concern directly their citizens are not communicated to the municipalities. This creates an obstacle to the correct interpretation and application of Article 10 BNC. These observations shed light on the wrongful implementation by the municipalities of the safeguard clause against statelessness in their decision on the granting of Belgian nationality to a child born to Syrian parents. 7. Conclusions This paper aimed at answering the following research question: how do Belgian laws and their implementation effectively prevent statelessness among asylum seekers' children from Syria who are born in Belgium? From a Syrian perspective, a child can inherit the stateless status from his parents when these are not recognised as national in Syria (specifically the Maktoumeen, Ajnabi and Palestinian populations). A child can also not be granted the Syrian nationality as a consequence of the gender discriminatory law when born abroad from a Syrian mother and when the filiation with a Syrian father cannot be established. From a Belgian perspective, strong legal safeguards exist to prevent statelessness for children born on Belgian soil, which are regulated under Article 10 of the Belgian Nationality Code. If otherwise stateless, any child under 18 or not yet emancipated born in Belgium acquires Belgian nationality and only loses it upon acquisition of another nationality. The acquisition is only refused when the child could acquire the nationality of one of his parents through a basic administrative step, such as registration at the consulate or embassy. The proof that another nationality cannot be acquired might be requested or not, depending on the legal status of the parents in Belgium. Among the five different legal statuses that asylum seeker parents can hold, which are registered asylum-seekers, recognised refugees, beneficiaries of subsidiary protection, migrants in irregular stay or as recognised stateless persons, only persons in irregular stay will have to provide such proofs. Though not explicitly mentioned, recognised stateless persons are exempted since the parents do not have an embassy nor consulate to turn to. In their judgments, Belgian courts have always interpreted the law strictly and rejected further mandatory requirements imposed by municipalities for Belgian nationality to be granted. They also confirmed the only ground for loss of nationality is the effective possession of another nationality, and that the possibility to acquire another nationality is not a legitimate ground for loss of Belgian nationality. However, an analysis of the acquisition in practice of Syrian or Belgian nationality following a birth in Belgium has shed light on obstacles asylum seekers' children might encounter with acquiring a nationality. Obstacles identified to acquisition of Syrian nationality were the costs of the birth registration, the requirements of a marriage certificate for the parents, and the difficulty with ensuring the filiation of the child with the father on the birth certificate. However, there is evidence that a solution was found to overcome the latter obstacle, via a judgment authorising the recognition of the child by a Syrian father. On the acquisition of Belgian nationality, birth registration was only found to be an obstacle for children of parents in irregular stay. However, for children of registered asylum seekers, the division of competence between the municipalities and the Immigration Office for keeping the aliens and population registers and the waiting register respectively were found to be an obstacle to acquisition of Belgian nationality. Finally, the field research, conducted through a questionnaire sent to selected municipalities, underlined the gaps between the legislation and practice. It identified the overall lack of expertise of 17