STATELESSNESS IN MODERN INTERNATIONAL LAW By James Hall The issue of stateless persons is a
For an individual to be considered
dilemma as old as the concept of a
stateless under the auspices of the
modern nation state. However, the
1954 Convention, they must be a
mechanisms regulating it are relatively
person who is ‘not considered a
new, and these mechanisms are facing
national by any state under the
mounting challenges.
operation of its law.’
Recently, the revision of citizenship lists
As well as these documents, numerous
in the north-eastern Indian province of
international agreements, including the
Assam, and the efforts of states to strip
Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
the citizenship of terrorists and their
confirm that it is accepted as custom in
associates,
international law that the right to a
have
been
central
to
debates on the consequences of the laws
and
customs
nationality is a human right.
surrounding
statelessness.
In 2018, the United Nations’ annual report into global trends in the forced
Internationally, statelessness is defined
displacement of people found that,
and discouraged by two major United
where data was available, 3.9 million
Nations documents: The Convention
individuals were stateless. The report
relating to the Status of Stateless
further acknowledged that due to
Persons (1954) and the Convention on
stateless
the Reduction of Statelessness (1961).
reported in national census data,
These conventions are designed to
official reports and other sources of
work in tandem to identify stateless
demographic information, this number
people, define their rights and to
is likely a drastic underrepresentation
encourage member states to actively
of the true total.
engage
in
reducing
individuals
being
under-
statelessness
worldwide.
Citing this information, UNHCR Chief Filippo Grandi has suggested that the 23
