In other cases, stateless individuals may be detained for much longer periods of time. U.S. law provides that all non-citizens detained following a final order of removal have the right to release after six months if they can demonstrate that there is “no significant likelihood of removal in the reasonably foreseeable future”.93 Nonetheless, some stateless persons have been detained beyond the six-month period, due in part to difficulties establishing a lack of nationality and the inability to obtain travel documents. There are currently no mechanisms to ensure that statelessness is consistently identified and taken into account when making custody determinations in the post-final order context. Enhancing immigration officials’ understanding of statelessness and providing the appropriate staff with training and tools to enable them to identify statelessness would greatly facilitate their ability to recognize when a detained individual is or may be stateless. Such efforts, combined with clear procedures and policies for follow-up once an assessment is made that an individual may be stateless would in turn better ensure that lack of nationality does not result in indefinite detention in the context of post-final order custody determinations. A related concern is what happens to stateless individuals with a final order of removal but for whom removal is not reasonably foreseeable after they have been released from detention. The regulations provide for release under an order of supervision requiring the individual to: (1) appear before an immigration officer periodically for identification; (2) submit, if necessary, to a medical and psychiatric examination; (3) give information under oath about his or her nationality, circumstances, habits, associations, and activities, and any other information requested by the authorities; (4) obey all applicable laws and other reasonable written restrictions on conduct or activities; (5) continue to seek travel documents, assist authorities in obtaining such documents, and provide the authorities with all correspondence with relevant embassies Solutions for the Stateless in the U.S. requesting the issuance of travel documents; (6) obtain advance approval of travel beyond previously specified times and distances; and (7) provide notice of change of address.94 Stateless individuals faced with this regime of supervised release with no foreseeable end date have unsuccessfully challenged such conditions under a variety of constitutional theories.95 Most stateless persons in the United States who are subject to orders of supervision remain in this condition of perpetual legal limbo with at times serious restrictions on all aspects of their life in the United States, unable to leave the country and unable to fully participate in society. The United States recently revised its policy guidance on the use of discretionary agency authority to set reporting requirements for individuals with final orders of removal who are being released from detention. In an August 2012 policy memorandum, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) explains to its officers that reporting requirements “may be reassessed and modified based on the alien’s level of compliance, ICE’s detention and enforcement priorities, changes to the circumstances of the individual case, and as a matter of discretion”.96 Applied with appropriate consideration of the particular intractability of statelessness, this new guidance should increase the likelihood that the reporting requirements for stateless individuals will be reasonable and not onerous. This new policy is an example of positive agency action that, if applied appropriately and consistently, will alleviate one of the burdensome restrictions often imposed on stateless individuals in the United States. An important next step, however, will be to issue specific guidance and develop training to ensure the memo is effectively implemented. 21