Everything you need to know about statelessness

Protecting stateless persons from arbitrary detention - A regional toolkit for practitioners

ENS has published a toolkit for practitioners from across Europe. It is intended as a resource for all those who come into contact with stateless…

Let’s talk about the army

How is the army relevant to statelessness? Conscription, a compulsory participation of citizens in their states’ military, still exists in over 60…

States as a root cause of statelessness

What is the root cause of statelessness? There are many answers to this question – conflict of nationality laws, gender discrimination, persecution…

Using the UPR to address statelessness

The United Nations Human Rights Council has a system of 'Universal Periodic Review' (UPR) which covers all member states of the UN.  This means that…

Statelessness determination procedure in Italy: who bears the burden of proof?

The Italian Court of Cassation has recently ruled on a case concerning the statelessness determination procedure (Court of Cassation No. 4262 of 3…

Statelessness in Ireland – international obligations and national reality

Ireland has adopted a somewhat incoherent approach in matters related to international conventions.  Sometimes, Ireland will not sign or ratify a…

Do stateless people have a right to die?

It was in October last year (2014) when Tereza, the long-term partner of my stateless client, came to my office and said to me: “Roman is in hospital…

Change is in the air: An update on efforts to tackle statelessness in the Netherlands

Whoever tells you that writing a doctorate thesis implies wasting four years of your life in the library is probably not researching statelessness…

Hungarian Constitutional Court declares that lawful stay requirement in statelessness determination breaches international law

Until now, only lawfully staying persons could initiate a statelessness determination procedure in Hungary. After nearly eight years of struggle…

Why Malta needs to accede to the UN Statelessness Conventions

“If I was granted citizenship now, it would be like having been inside this room for twelve years [referring to a very small and crammed counselling…

Statelessness in Italy: What’s next?

“It is time to give voice to the strangers among strangers”. With these words, journalist Gad Lerner introduced the first public meeting on…

Strategically litigating statelessness: ENS’s three-year strategy

The European Network on Statelessness (ENS) is launching its three-year litigation strategy, based on the belief that part of the fight to end…