100 2 van Genugten et al. What Does the Problem Look Like? Everybody knows some examples of indigenous peoples, like Australian Aboriginals, Kenyan Maasai or Native Americans. Although there is no worldwide accepted definition of indigenous peoples, it is agreed upon that these people(s) are indigenous because of the fact that they inhabited a country, or part thereof, before conquerors or colonial powers came in; that they had and still have their own customs and traditions; and, on the subjective side, that they identify themselves as indigenous and want to be recognized as such. Taking this broad description as a starting point, it is assumed that about 5 to 6 percent of the world population consists of indigenous people(s). Approximately two-thirds of them live in Asia.5 The Tilburg University Statelessness Programme stresses that ‘[s]tatelessness is a global phenomenon that currently affects as many as 12 million people worldwide’.6 Official numbers communicated by governments to the UNHCR are limited to about 3 million.7 However, there is no clear data on how many of those qualify as indigenous people. On the other hand, some quantitative (as well as qualitative) research has been conducted on the situation of specific indigenous communities in countries where the issue of statelessness has become extremely problematic, like in India,8 Thailand,9 and, in a more positive sense, the Philippines.10 The following example of the Hill tribes in Thailand illustrates the profound consequences of statelessness on all aspects of the life of indigenous people, in this case an estimated half a million people.11 The lack of citizenship renders 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 IRIN ‘ASIA: Indigenous Groups - Stateless and Sick’ IRIN (9 February 2012) <http://www .irinnews.org/report/94816/ASIA-Indigenous-groups-stateless-and-sick> accessed 5 October 2013. <http://www.tilburguniversity.edu/research/institutes-and-research-groups/statelessness/> accessed 21 October 2013. UNHCR Global Trends 2012, Displacement, the New 21st Century Challenge (2012) 2. <http:// www.unhcr.org/51bacb0f9.html> accessed 21 October 2013. See for instance the research project aiming to map the statelessness in India: Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (2009) <http://mcrg.ac.in/Statelessness/Statelessness_Concept .html> accessed 5 October 2013. Charlotte Becker, ‘Impact of Statelessness in Thailand: Universal Human Rights Violations in Relation to U.S. Foreign Policy’ (2008) UW Bothell Policy Journal 37, 37-38. Available at: <http://uwbpolicyjournal.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/impact-of-statelessness.pdf> and Thailand, New Constitution and Indigenous Peoples (Asian Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Network) <http://www.aitpn.org/IRQ/vol-II/Issue-03/story01.html> both accessed 21 October 2013. See below Part 3. Ibid, n 9. tilburg law review 19 (2014) 98-107