The Stateless Kurds Of Syria 2 175 Quantitative Evaluation - Acquisition of I.D. Firstly, the access to citizenship will be assessed in light of Decree 49 from April 2011, which introduces the naturalization process.14 Since a more extensive analysis of this specific measure is available elsewhere,15 present focus will be limited to a consideration of the number of its ‘beneficiaries.’ Based on survey questions asked of Syrian Kurdish refugees in Domiz camp (KR) by UNHCR Iraq during 2013, 92 percent of those claiming to have ever been registered as ajanib were now Syrian nationals.16 94 percent of ajanib had attempted to benefit from the provisions of Decree 49, with an impressive success rate of 98 percent. There was much lower incidence of maktumin, only 7 percent of those surveyed, and of these, 77 percent considered themselves still to hold no Syrian or other nationality.17 A priori there is no reason to assume that statelessness would be more or less prevalent among Syrian Kurds outside the camp in the rest of the Kurdistan Region. This implies that while most maktumin (though surprisingly few in number were surveyed)18 continue to be excluded, Syrian nationality for ajanib had become remarkably accessible. Nonetheless, it is necessary also to consider the impact Decree 49 and its related naturalization have on perceptions of national identity for Syrian (stateless) Kurds, and to evaluate newly acquired citizenship within the present Syrian context of civil war. 14 15 16 17 18 Article 1 of presidential Decree 49 issued on April 7 2011 ‘grants Syrian Arab citizenship to registered “foreigners” in Hassaka.’ The decree contains no criteria for how the process would be carried out. Albarazi (n 10) 18–22; McGee (n 11) 95–104. Given the political sensitivities in contacting stateless Kurds in Syria, and their scattered distribution in Turkey and the Kurdistan Region, it was not possible to approach the large number of subjects that would be necessary to gain meaningful statistical data. Since this is beyond the scope of work for a single researcher, I am particularly grateful to UNHCR Iraq for sharing its quantitative data on the subject. This data was collected through a mobile survey conducted by UNHCR partners with 1974 individual Syrian Kurds over a period of 5 days. Of these, 579 individuals had at some point been registered as ajanib (29% of the sample). Only 51 of these still held ajnabi status at the point of questioning. Of the 1974 individuals surveyed, only 132 responded to having ever been maktumin, of which 101 remained so by the time the survey was implemented. The figure is surprisingly low given previous estimates for the prevalence of maktumin in Kurdish society in Syria: Kurdwatch, Stateless Kurds in Syria: Illegal Invaders or Victims of a Nationalistic Policy? (Report 5, Kurdwatch, 2010): <www.kurdwatch.org/pdf/kurdwatch _staatenlose_en.pdf> accessed 13 August 2013. Evaluating this result, however, is beyond the scope of the present study. tilburg law review 19 (2014) 171-181