28. The Civil Status Law requires that all births in the country be declared and registered before the civil registration office of the administrative district of birth within three months of the time of birth, regardless of the nationality of the child concerned. If this is not done, a child can no longer be registered in the local civil registry and late birth registration falls under the local courts. This is generally more expensive compared to regular civil registration. 29. Public servants lack proper training on how to register new-born babies, while the general public is illinformed about birth registration procedures. People wishing to register the birth of a child often have to deal with corruption and extortion by Officers of the Civil Registry. In both rural and urban areas, the principle of free birth registration is not respected. The sums demanded by officers in charge of registration vary depending on the service, generally starting at 2,000 OF. 30. The Public Registry is in a poor state. Some documents have been destroyed, damaged, or lost. A large number of civil registries were destroyed during the different crises that affected the country and have yet to be replaced. 31. Côte d’Ivoire’s Civil Status Law also requires that foundlings, defined in Article 46 as found new-borns, also comply with the normal birth registration procedures, which can add an additional barrier to acquisition of nationality. Deprivation of nationality 32. The 1961 Nationality Code has a set of nationality revocation grounds enshrined in Articles 52 to 55. A person's nationality can be withdrawn if, for instance, a person behaves like a foreign national19 or if a person is convicted of an act constituting a crime or correctional offence against the internal or external security of the State or against established institutions.20 However, none of the denationalisation grounds include a safeguard against statelessness in line with the 1961 Convention. These denationalisation grounds are extremely broad and vague and require further defining and interpretation. Also, it is not clear how often grounds for denationalisation are invoked. Impact of Statelessness 33. Being stateless in Côte d’Ivoire can result in significant violations of other fundamental rights, which include lack of access to public education, healthcare and other services; inability to access employment, impeded family reunification; social alienation and psychological challenges and discrimination. Stateless persons often live in dire living circumstances, unable to escape poverty. Statelessness can also lead to exclusion from society, including of children born in the territory. 34. Unlike other non-nationals, stateless people have nowhere to be returned to if subjected to deportation proceedings. Finally, given the significance of the size of the stateless population, and its 19 Act No. 1961-415 of 14 December 1961 promulgating the Ivory Coast Nationality Code, as amended by Act No. 1972-852 of 21 December 1972 [], 1961-415; 1972-852, 21 December 1972 Article 52. 20 Ibid., Article 54(1) and (2). 7