FRONTIERS RIGHTS SEEKING NATIONALITY THE JUDICIAL ODYSSEY OF APPLICANTS • NADER WAS BORN IN 1960 AND HOLDS THE “UNDER STUDY” CARD. He is married to a Lebanese woman and have 10 children registered in the under-study category. Both his parents were registered as “under study”. Nader’s ascendants moved from Turkey to Lebanon before World War I when his father was taken to work with the Ottoman army during the war. The ascendants of Nader do not hold the Turkish nationality. Nader fled to Germany during the Lebanese Civil war where he applied for refugee status. During the process of refugee determination, the German authorities obtained confirmation from the Turkish authorities that Nader does not have the Turkish nationality. SEEKING NATIONALITY | PART 2 holder of “under-study” cards, the courts considered that these cards do not “prove that their nationality is unknown but that the Lebanese State is not able to study their situation in order to determine whether or not they can be given the Lebanese nationality. Hence, such cases do not meet the conditions of Article 1 (2) and (3) of Decree No. 15 /1925.38 Another court decision stated that “the temporary residency cards issued by the General Security, indicating that the holders are of an unspecified nationality [after they migrated to Lebanon more than 30 years ago and reported that they cut off all ties with their native country, Czech Republic] and given with the intention of counting foreigners living in Lebanon for a long time without holding or presenting their original identity cards or passports to official authorities. This aims to count the numbers of foreigners and regulate their stay in Lebanon until their situation is permanently resolved. The expression unspecified nationality indicated on these cards, which was later replaced by nationality “understudy” as set forth in the opinion of the General Directorate of Census, cannot be considered, in the opinion of this court, a definite proof that the appellant’s parents became of unknown nationality.” The judgement continues: “whereas it is required that the appellants prove that their parents permanently lost their original Czech nationality, and that both the parents and the appellants were unable to obtain this nationality for reasons beyond their control related to the relevant nationality law.”39 The courts position is based on the Court of Cassation jurisprudence in one case related to a holder of “under study card”. The Cassation Court stated that “the fact that cassation appellants hold a nationality understudy card issued by the administrative authorities does not prevent them from knowing their real nationality through a judicial authority, as is the case in the current lawsuit.”40 In another jurisprudence, the Court of Cassation stated that “there is nothing in the law called a nationality under-study... the departments of General Security… give them a card indicating that they their situation and nationality are being studied… this denomination is only given to non-Lebanese…legally known as foreigners.”41 Further, the Committee of Legislation and Consultation considered that “the situation of people whose nationality is under-study is suspended until it is proven…as to whether these people hold a foreign nationality or not…”42 The majority of the persons that fall under Article 1 (3) belong to the newly created States after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, particularly Turkey, Iraq and Syria. These people came to Lebanon after 30/08/1924 and cut off all ties with their countries of origin. The statelessness of these persons can be resolved in Lebanon on Jus Soli grounds if born in Lebanon to parents with unknown nationalities, and if they have proven that they cannot obtain the nationality of their country of origin by affiliation. Two jus soli lawsuits were filed on the grounds that the parents are of unknown nationality. The strategic litigation of these lawsuits is to elicit the court’s position regarding the explanation of Article 1 (3) of the 1925 Nationality Law. Jus Soli Lawsuits on Grounds of Article 1 (2) and (3) of Decree 15/1925 Combined Considering the difficulty of implementing the second part of para 3 of Article 1 of Decision No. 15/1925, 13 lawsuits were filed using para 2 (inability to obtain the parents’ foreign nationality by affiliation) and para3 (parents have no nationality). This applies mainly to refugees who fled in Lebanon after 30 August 1924 and who lost the nationality of their country of origin. 50