Biharis in Bangladesh: Inching Toward Integration

By Maureen Lynch
Seven years ago a group of young Urdu-speakers claiming to be citizens of Bangladesh filed a petition to demand enrollment in the country’s list of voters.  The government challenged their request, but the High Court determined they are "citizens of Bangladesh and their residence in the Geneva Camp, Mohammedpur, is not a bar to be enrolled as voters."  Five years later, in May 2008, a landmark decision in the Supreme Court restored the citizenship rights of the so-called Urdu-speaking refugees and stateless people (also known as Biharis, or stranded Pakistanis) who had languished in

The Faili Kurds of Iraq: Thirty Years Without Nationality

By Elizabeth Campbell
Thirty years ago, in April 1980, between 220,000 and 300,000 Iraqi Faili Kurds were stripped of their Iraqi citizenship. Many were expelled from their homes and were forced to march across the Iranian border into decades of exile and statelessness. Others became non-citizens in their own country. Though important steps have been taken by the Government of Iraq to restore the citizenship of these people, it is estimated that roughly 100,000 still lack a nationality.

United Arab Emirates: Nationality Matters

By Maureen Lynch
It’s been five years now since Refugees International first visited the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to better understand and then call for solutions on behalf of the country’s stateless population – the bidoon.  Since mid-2008 there have been a number of media reports indicating that change was afoot, and that efforts were being made to tackle statelessness through a one-time only special registration process.  So, when the possibility popped up of visiting the country last summer, we took it.

Ten Humanitarian Headlines for 2010

By Joel Charny
It’s now standard to wrap up the year with lists of ten: best films; greatest sporting moments; most influential people. In the spirit of a hopeful start to the New Year and decade, I propose a different sort of list: ten events we’d like to see in the world of humanitarian action in 2010. None of the mock headlines below herald an era of global peace and harmony. But each of these headlines could plausibly appear in the coming year, and Refugees International will be doing everything in its power to make them happen.

Hidden People, Hidden Problems: Statelessness and Gender Based Violence

By Maureen Lynch

Dragana* was 16 years old and stateless.  Until last year she lived in a Roma settlement in the former Yugoslavia with an abusive man who referred to himself as her uncle.  She has no memory of her parents. Last year Dragana's uncle began to talk about arranging a marriage for Dragana with an older man he knew.  She did not want to get married, but given her lack of legal documentation, she was not in school and had little to look forward to in her life.  She wondered if this older man might provide for her better than her uncle. Later she realized that this marriage was a sham and she was being sold into prostitution.  She is now in another country where she still can not gain access to the legal support that would enable her to gain documentation and go home.  Now 17, Dragana feels trapped, exploited and alone.

Kuwait: Human Dignity

By Maureen Lynch
All people are born free and equal in dignity and rights.  At least that’s what the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights says.  And while the concept itself is somewhat philosophical in nature and today may not seem to be particularly well defined to some people, everyone knows what it feels like when it’s missing.  Denial of human dignity is hurtful – it is an ‘affront to human dignity’, after all. 

Dominican Republic: Of Baseball Players and Birth Certificates

By Melanie Teff
U.S. major league baseball teams recently started requiring potential players and their parents to undergo DNA testing to prove who recruits are – an attempt to try to ensure that they aren't understating their age in order to win more lucrative contracts. Fortunately there is a better, cheaper and more reliable way to confirm age and identity. It’s called birth registration.

Iraq: Finding a Future for the Iraqi Palestinians

By Melanie Teff
I watched President Obama’s Cairo speech about US relations with the Muslim world while in the “no man’s land” between the Syrian and Iraqi border-posts. Seven hundred and eighty Iraqi Palestinian refugees are currently forced to stay in this inhospitable stretch of desert known as Al-Tanf camp. They are confined to this small area – in effect living in a prison camp.

Statelessness: Living in Limbo

By Benjamin Johnston
The latest edition of Oxford University's "Forced Migration Review" features more than 20 articles on statelessness. These articles draw attention not only to this neglected issue but also provide constructive solutions towards finding an end to the ubiquitous struggle that affects some 12 million people from as far afield as Japan to Ecuador. Perhaps the biggest issue at hand with statelessness is a country's failure to acknowledge basic human rights to services such as health care, protection from child trafficking, and the ability to pursue legal work.

Picturing Statelessness

By Maureen Lynch

What does statelessness look like?  It’s not easy to succinctly explain the plight of the millions of people who have no legal ties to any government.  For years I have struggled to identify a one-word metaphor to illustrate this widely unknown and generally overlooked human rights problem. Today I found one.

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