10 Actions to End Statelessness Requirements and procedures for naturalization need to be amended to make it easier for stateless refugees and migrants to acquire nationality, for instance, by reducing the required number of years of residence or lowering or waiving application fees. Information on naturalisation requirements needs to be easily accessible. States can take such measures even when they are not party to the 1954 Convention. Evidence shows that establishing statelessness determination procedures does not increase migration of stateless persons to the territory of States with such procedures. HOW CAN UNHCR HELP? Major activities: 1. Advocate and provide technical advice to relevant ministries and parliaments for the establishment of determination procedures and protection regimes. 2. Provide training to increase the capacity of relevant government agencies to undertake statelessness determination. 3. Support the establishment of screening processes to improve identification of stateless persons detained for immigration-related purposes and to secure the release of such persons from detention pending a decision on their status consistent with the 2014 Monitoring Immigration Detention: Practical Manual.5 5 4. Promote naturalization as a solution for stateless migrants and refugees and emphasize the need for the adoption of facilitated procedures that take into account the special needs of these groups. 5. Organize study visits by concerned governments to States with well-established determination procedures. 6. Encourage States which are not already party to the 1954 Convention to accede in accordance with the activities set out under Action 9. WHAT EXISTING CIRCUMSTANCES CAN FACILITATE IMPLEMENTATION OF THIS ACTION? • • • • Pledges to establish statelessness determination procedures made by particular States at UNHCR’s 2011 Ministerial Meeting. A number of States with determination procedures are willing to provide technical support to governments which are studying establishment of procedures. Eighteen States have acceded to the 1954 Convention since 2011 and a number are studying measures to implement it. A number of countries that already have in place domestic mechanisms to determine statelessness only need to ensure that such mechanisms are linked to grant of a legal status that permits residence, enjoyment of basic human rights and facilitated naturalization. UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Association for the Prevention of Torture (APT) and the International Detention Coalition (IDC), Monitoring Immigration Detention: Practical Manual, 2014, available at: http://www.refworld.org/ docid/53706e354.html. U N H C R > G LO B A L AC T I O N P L A N TO E N D S TAT E L E S S N E S S : 2 0 1 4 – 2 0 2 4 21