NUMBER 147 • ISSUE 3 • 2007 SPECIAL REPORT The strange, hidden world of the stateless THE EDITOR’S DESK New twist to a sad tale here are strong fears that some small true total may be closer to 15 million. island states will soon start disappearing altogether Some people end up stateless because of legislative or Tas a result of climate change. Among those consid- bureaucratic accidents – not necessarily because someone ered particularly vulnerable are Kiribati, Vanuatu, has deliberately deprived them of their national identity. the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu, the Maldives and the Bahamas. Even if no state has sunk yet, millions have become stateless High tides are already destroying homes, gardens and because the state in which they or their ancestors were born fresh water supplies on Papua New Guinea’s Carteret Islands, has changed shape in some abstract way: been created or di- which may vanish completely beneath the waves as early as vided or dissolved, decolonized, conquered or freed. 2015. An evacuation of the Carterets’ 2,000 inhabitants to an- Whenever a state is modified in some such fundamental other part of Papua New Guinea has way, the issue of who is – and who is begun. not – a citizen comes to the fore. Those If low-lying island states such as who fall through the cracks during Kiribati (population 93,000) and Tu- this process often have nowhere else to valu (population 10,000) follow suit, go. Powerless to alter their situation, their problems will be much more they are often pushed by the complex than simply packing up and bureaucratic tide to the margins of moving somewhere else. All the insti- society, where they stay vulnerable, tutions of a modern nation state – impoverished and all too easy to parliaments, police, law courts, state ignore. education and healthcare – will have Others become stateless as an disappeared along with the coral atolls, unforeseen consequence of a change sandy beaches and palm trees. in domestic legislation, or because of The islanders will either have to an incompatibility between the laws of find a way to reconstitute their van- two different states. And a sizeable ished state elsewhere, or they will have minority are the victims of a more to find another state to adopt them as pernicious form of statelessness: the citizens, give them a passport and pro- deliberate exclusion of entire groups vide them with all the other forms of because of some political, religious or protection and assistance that a state ethnic discrimination. exists to give its people. Alternatively AP / A. SHIMBUN S. YAMAMOTO TUV•2007 But there are some currents of fresh they will become stateless – about as Tuvalu: one of the island nations most air blowing through the strange, sad threatened by climate change. stateless as you can possibly be. world of the stateless. There have been A 2005 working paper submitted to recent political and legislative the un Commission on Human Rights framed the dilemma breakthroughs for large groups of stateless people in Sri succinctly: “Whilst States […] are used to addressing issues of Lanka, Thailand, Nepal, and some Gulf States. Gradually State succession, it would appear that the extinction of a more governments are realizing that burying their heads in State, without there being a successor, is unprecedented…” the sand when it comes to groups of stateless people on their The paper then outlined a long list of awkward questions territory is no solution. that would arise in such a scenario, most of them concerning If this trend continues, it may just be that by the time the the rights of the affected population, and who would be re- first island state is submerged, its erstwhile inhabitants will sponsible for ensuring those rights were observed. find a world more inclined to take the necessary steps to It will be scant consolation – but, in the event of a state prevent them from being forced into the shadowy global sinking, its inhabitants will not be alone. unhcr (which has a ghetto of the stateless. Arresting climate change will be a mandate for stateless people as well as for refugees) Herculean task. But preventing this particular side effect currently has an official figure of 5.8 million stateless people should not be beyond the collective capability of the spread across 49 countries. However, the agency believes the international community. 2 REFUGEES N°147 • 2007 Editor Rupert Colville French Editor Cécile Pouilly Contributors 4 COVER STORY Greg Constantine, Keith Delaney, Betsy Greve, Nanda Na Champassak, Gisèle Stateless people often live on the margins Nyembwe, Barbara Porteous and unhcr of society: vulnerable, impoverished and all staff worldwide. too easy to ignore. Editorial Assistant Manuela Raffoni UNHCR / G.M.B. AKASH BGD•2006 16 NEPAL MOVES MOUNTAINS Photo Department Stateless people are Suzy Hopper, Anne Kellner born, or created by A massive government campaign in Nepal Design 4mistake, every day. has regularized the citizenship status of Vincent Winter Associés, Paris 2.6 million people. Production Françoise Jaccoud Distribution 18 STATELESS ACHIEVERS John O’Connor, Frédéric Tissot A film-maker, physicist, writer and cello player Photo Engraving Aloha Scan, Geneva who all rose to the top, despite being stateless. Maps unhcr Mapping Unit 20 SRI LANKAN SUCCESS STORY Historical documents unhcr archives Sri Lanka has granted citizenship to 190,000 REFUGEES is published by the Media UNHCR / G.M.B. AKASH BGD•2006 Tamil tea-pickers whose ancestors were Relations and Public Information Service of Naturalization imported by the British two centuries ago. the United Nations High Commissioner for means new Refugees. The opinions expressed by 20opportunities for Sri contributors are not necessarily those of Lanka’s stateless tea-pickers. 24 SORRY, WRONG GENDER unhcr. The designations and maps used do not imply the expression of any opinion or In some countries, a mother cannot pass on recognition on the part of unhcr her nationality to her children – only the concerning the legal status of a territory or of its authorities. father can. REFUGEES reserves the right to edit all articles before publication. Articles and photos not NO HUSBAND, NO COUNTRY covered by copyright © may be reprinted 26 without prior permission. Please credit For Vietnamese women who marry foreigners, unhcr and the photographer. Requests for losing your husband may also mean losing copyrighted photos should be directed to the agency credited. your country. English and French editions printed in Italy AFP / P. UTOMI EKPEI NER•2006 by amilcare pizzi S.p.A., Milan. Circulation: 111,000 in English, French, Statelessness has 28 AFRICA’S HIDDEN PROBLEM Italian and Spanish. had a destabilizing Colonial legacies, political manipulation and 28effect in several ISSN 0252-791 X African countries. environmental factors are all contributing to a rise in statelessness in Africa. Front cover: Stateless Muslims from Northern Rakhine State in Myanmar (also known as Rohingyas) living in Bangladesh. UNHCR / G.M.B. AKASH / BGD•2006 30 SUDDENLY YOU ARE NOBODY Back cover: The hands of a 75-year-old A Zimbabwean newspaper publisher leads stateless woman labourer in a Sri Lankan a campaign against statelessness. tea plantation. UNHCR / G. AMARASINGHE / LKA•2007 UNHCR P.O. Box 2500 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland www.unhcr.org REFUGEES 3 Millions seek to escape the grim world of the stateless Some stateless people – like these ones in a camp in Bangladesh – are also UNHCR / G.M.B. AKASH BGD•2006 refugees. But most are not. 4 REFUGEES “To be stripped of citizenship is to be stripped of worldliness; it is like returning to a wilderness as cavemen or savages ...they could live and die without leaving any trace.” —HANNAH ARENDT “The Origins of Totalitarianism” BY P HILIPPE L ECLERC STRIPPED OF THEIR RIGHTS AND R UPERT C OLVILLE Some people – like Hannah Arendt, who lost her German citizenship after nlike the philosopher fleeing the Nazis in 1933, or the Feili Kurds Hannah Arendt (who was who were expelled from Saddam Hussein’s stateless for 16 years but still Iraq – become stateless as a result of offi- had an immensely successful cial decrees deliberately aimed at ex- Ucareer), most stateless people are – almost cluding them from any meaningful role by definition – anonymous. People who in society, or at driving them out of the live in the shadows at the edge of society. country, or (in the case of Europe’s Jews in People with no chance of a career at all. the Nazi era) as a prelude to an attempt to Stateless people can be found in all exterminate them altogether. the corners of the planet – in developed as Perversely, on occasion it can even be well as developing countries. And there the development of democracy that stim- are many ways to become stateless. Some ulates the omission of a particular group are stateless because of actions taken long from the list of nationals – because of the ago, and other stateless people are being fear of those in charge that the group in born – or created by mistake – every day. question, or some prominent individuals REFUGEES 5 Perversely, eveN the developmeNt of democracy c effects of badly designed laws, poor birth registration systems, other administrative oversights, or simply because of a clash of different legislations in different states. The results for the people concerned are often shat- tering. Through no fault of their own, some people – including the 24 year-old woman whose desperate plea from her detention cell is shown on the left – may end up losing their liberty because their parents infringed immigration rules when they were a small child. They may then stay locked up for an indefinite period because there is no state that accepts them as citizens.