ABSTRACT
The UNHCR refers to statelessness as a ‘curse’, and prioritises tackling it through its eradication (UNHCR 2014a, pp. 2, 9), rather than through ensuring access to legal rights by stateless persons. Jean Asselborn, Minister of Immigration and Asylum for Luxembourg, described the EU’s support for the eradication of statelessness as an act ‘on behalf of stateless persons’. 1 Yet, the case studies described in this chapter illustrate that emphasis on replacing statelessness by a nationality 2 is not always in the interest of stateless persons. Nationality status can be more problematic than statelessness in specific circumstances due to, for example, a peculiar historical context of a stateless population, political convictions of the individuals concerned, or the risk of human rights violations associated with acquiring a particular nationality. Pursuing the elimination of statelessness as a policy goal per se, without regard to preferences and the human rights situation of the affected persons, cannot be justified by reference to the interests of those persons. 3 This chapter argues that a statelessness policy informed by the interests of stateless persons should prioritise the identification and protection of stateless persons over the elimination of statelessness. In many cases the two policy goals of protecting stateless persons and eliminating statelessness will not be in tension with each other when access to a wider range of rights can best be achieved through the acquisition of an appropriate nationality (Hirsh Ballin 2014). However, when this is not the case, priority should be given to wider protection of the human rights of affected persons over the goal of eradicating statelessness.
