UNHCR Campaign to End Statelessness Update October 2016

Summary of developments in the #ibelong campaign to end statelessness around the world, including, from Africa:

• In July in Southern Africa, the Southern Africa Trade Union Coordination Council, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation and UNHCR hosted a capacity building workshop on the right to nationality in Johannesburg for 28 labour union representatives from 13 Southern African countries. At the workshop, partners developed strategies to protect the right to a nationality of migrant workers and members of their families. Also in July, Lawyers for Human Rights and UNHCR launched a regional network of 25 civil society organizations working on statelessness in Southern Africa.
• In August in Botswana, the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) Ministerial Dialogue on Mixed and Irregular Migration agreed to ground- breaking commitments to pursue gender equality in nationality matters, to move towards a ministerial declaration on statelessness and to encourage member states to accede to the Statelessness Conventions.
• On 23 and 24 August in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, UNHCR organized a multi-stakeholder workshop to discuss innovation and statelessness with government representatives. The event was co-facilitated by UNHCR Innovation, a UNHCR resource to help integrate new thinking and ideas into protection work, and in this case to improve case management and referral of stateless persons in Côte d’Ivoire.
• In August, UNHCR, in close collaboration with the government of Sierra Leone and the National Commission for Social Action, undertook a fact finding mission to the border areas of the country to collect information to support the development a National Action Plan to End Statelessness.
• In September, Guinea-Bissau deposited instruments of accession to both Statelessness Conventions at the annual Treaty Event in New York organised by the UN Office of Legal Affairs.