In addition, this section will highlight as examples of positive practices efforts to ensure issuance of legal documentation to individuals in precarious situations, including efforts to achieve state recognition of alternative forms of documentation. Forcibly displaced communities often flee their homes without identity documents, and may fear seeking help from authorities of their country of nationality. While a legal status and recognition by the state can in theory exist without the issuance of documentation, “[r]ecognition of legal identity often depends on an individual possessing valid legal identity documentation or other forms of proof of legal identity.”52 Individuals lacking documentation establishing their identity may be subject to detention or forcible removal from the country they are living in, and may face a greater likelihood of being subjected to human trafficking and/or smuggling. Because legal status and documentation also serve as the primary means enabling access to basic rights and entitlements, some practices to combat the lack of documentation are outlined in the third section of this report, which focuses on access to education, health care, and formal employment. Legislative Practices Granting Legal Status through Citizenship or Refugee Recognition Universal Birth Registration In Bangladesh, despite the existence of a clear legislative mandate, birth registration for both Rohingya and Bangladeshi residents of Cox’s Bazar was, until recently, completely halted by the relevant Bangladeshi authorities. This suspension was purportedly imposed to prevent the registration of Rohingya children as Bangladeshi nationals.53 BANGLADESH The Births and Deaths Registration Act of 2004 introduced compulsory birth registration for “any Bangladeshi or any foreigner living in Bangladesh and also any refugee taking shelter in Bangladesh.” The Act’s applicability to Rohingya refugee children was further underlined by the issuance of a 2009 circular regarding the provision of birth registration to Rohingya refugee children living in the Kutupalong and Nayapara camps.54 THAILAND The 2008 Civil Registration Act amendments allowed for all children born in Thai territory to have their births registered, irrespective of their nationality and/or legal status, and also allowed retrospective registration;55 children of migrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and stateless persons are therefore entitled to have their births registered. In 2010, Thailand also withdrew its reservation to Article 7 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, reinforcing their obligation to provide birth registration to all children born on Thai territory. Article 7 includes provisions for the right to a name and the right to acquire nationality. 16 UND OING PRECARIT Y: ELE VATING P OSITIVE PR ACTICES FOR REFU GEE PROTECTION IN SO U TH AND SO U THE AST ASIA