in obtaining Ukrainian citizenship. Some 28,000 who had cancelled their permanent residency status in other countries before the citizenship legislation of those countries entered into force became de jure stateless. Another 80,000 who had remained registered in their previous country of residence when its citizenship legislation entered into force had become de jure citizens of those states. As a result, they were not automatically granted Ukrainian citizenship. Although they were offered access to Ukrainian citizenship through individual naturalization procedures, most of the returnees who had hoped to acquire Ukrainian citizenship could not meet the stringent requirements of those procedures, which included five years residence in Ukraine, sufficient income, and knowledge of the Ukrainian language. UNHCR, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and the Council of Europe encouraged the Ukrainian government to amend its citizenship law to address these problems. UNHCR offered training and technical assistance to the Ukrainian Passport and Naturalization Service and organized a media campaign on citizenship. Local NGOs, supervised by UNHCR, provided legal counselling to applicants for Ukrainian citizenship and represented individuals during legal proceedings with the Ukrainian authorities. In an effort to reduce, and ultimately prevent, statelessness, the Ukrainian parliament, in consultation with UNHCR, amended the country’s Citizenship Law seven times during the legislation’s first ten years of existence. In May 1997, language and income requirements for applicants were removed, and descendents of formerly deported persons were allowed to acquire Ukrainian citizenship on the grounds of their forebear’s origin in the territory of Crimea. These positive amendments made it possible for some 28,000 de jure stateless returnees to finally acquire Ukrainian citizenship. While these amendments went a long way toward resolving the problems of individuals who were stateless, other obstacles to acquiring Ukrainian citizenship including the country’s constitutional ban on dual citizenship, remained. Returnees who had already become de jure citizens of Uzbekistan before they returned to Crimea, for example, had to be formally released from Uzbek citizenship before they were able to obtain Ukrainian citizenship. The renunciation of Uzbek citizenship, however, required payment of US$100, a visit to the Uzbek embassy in Kiev, and an administrative procedure that often lasted more than a year. UNHCR and the OSCE mediated negotiations between the two countries that led to a bilateral agreement, adopted in 1998, that simplified the procedures for changing citizenship. Uzbekistan agreed to waive renunciation fees and allowed local passport offices of the Ukrainian Ministry of Interior to collect renunciation applications and forward them to the Uzbek authorities. In response to concerns raised by UNHCR, an administrative policy was adopted requiring that the 30