Syrian Citizenship Disappeared 2. Methodology of the report: This report is the result of intense efforts STJ has conducted between the beginning of 2018 and August the same year. It relies on 54 statements and interviews, conducted by the organisation’s field researchers. 38 of them are faceto-face, while the 8 others were conducted via Internet with eyewitnesses and stateless people (both ajanib and maktumeen) in different geographical regions starting from Al-Malikiyah/Derek to Qamishli/ Qamishlo via Amuda, Ad Darbasiyah, Ras al-Ayn/Sari Kani al-Hasakah city and others, as well as those deployed in a number of asylum countries such as Turkey, Iraqi Kurdistan, Europe and others. The report also drew on 8 testimonies and interviews from lawyers, researchers and specialists in the Kurdish and citizenship issues. The drafters of this report have reviewed dozens of sources and references that have approached the subject since 1962 until today, quoting from 63 of them to benefit from and build upon the efforts made in this field. 3. Introduction: Through this in-depth report, STJ seeks to document and list the reasons behind the special census of 1962, and to highlight the suffering of tens of thousands of people who have been stripped of their nationality as a result, especially the maktumeen, within Syria or in asylum. The report relates 49 years of statelessness, from 1962 to 2011, and the catastrophic consequences of it, by recounting stories of the 1962 census victims. The census, that was conducted on 5 October 1962 in application of Decree No. 93 of 23 August 1962, was special to al-Hasakah province, northeastern Syria, and was the result of tumultuous political years in Syria. On 30 January 1958, Syria’s president Shukri al-Quwatli’s visit to Cairo accompanied by the cabinet members, and on 1 February 1958, Sabri al-Asali, Syria’s Prime Minister, proclaimed the formation of the United Arab Republic, that would be headed by the elected Gamal Abdel Nasser5. The Interim Constitution of the Republic was promulgated on Wednesday, 5 March 1958. It stated: “Nationality in the United Arab Republic is defined by law. Nationality in the United Arab Republic is enjoyed by all bearers of the Syrian or Egyptian nationalities; or who are entitled to it by laws or statutes in force in Syria or Egypt at the time this Constitution takes effect.”6The Egyptian-Syrian union did not last long, however. It collapsed on 28 September 1961, by the “Supreme Arab Revolutionary Command of the Armed Forces”, which entrusted Maamun al-Kuzbari to form the new government, authorizing him to issue decrees on the nomination of ministers and the composition of the new cabinet, which was announced on 20 November 1961, about a week after the adoption of the country’s interim constitution, headed by Izzat al-Nuss. The parliament and the constitutional council held a second meeting on Thursday morning, 14 December 1961, under the chairmanship of Maamun al-Kuzbari to elect a President of the Republic out of the two candidates Khalid al-Azm and Nazim al-Kudsi, who won the presidency. 5 Hashim Othman, The Modern History of Syria (Beirut-Lebanon: Riad El-Rayyes Books), 303 and 305. 6 Ibid. 6