On 18 June,2021
This report by a Global COVID19 Consortium documents the many hard-hitting impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on stateless people, highlighting how statelessness continues to be a blind-spot for actors with responsibilities and obligations to respect, promote and fulfil rights. It also showcases important initiatives by stateless groups and sets out a roadmap for concerted and sustained change.
The unique methodology of the report is grounded in the information and experiences documented by Consortium members, in INDIA, MALAYSIA, BANGLADESH, MYANMAR, NEPAL, KYRGYZSTAN, KAZAKHSTAN, TAJIKISTAN, UZBEKISTAN, NORTH MACEDONIA, MONTENEGRO, KENYA, AND THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC.
KEY FINDINGS of the report:
The rights violations that stateless communities always experienced, both by design and default, have been exacerbated by the pandemic. They now have life and death implications.
Stateless people’s precarious legal status and lack of documents has had an insidious impact: denial of relief, healthcare and vaccinations; inability to work in safe and non-exploitative jobs; and denial of access to justice.
Lazy and cynical narratives have been rehashed to scapegoat and blame stateless people for the spread of the virus and impose punitive, discriminatory lockdown measures on such communities.
High costs and fear of authorities have had a combined impact on stateless communities’ access to life-saving healthcare, to the knock-on detriment of public health.
Government, UN and other agencies, have generally failed to recognise the specific challenge of statelessness and tailor policies to address this challenge and prioritise stateless communities.
In India, for example, 1.9 million people (mainly Muslims Hindus of Bengali ethnicity) were deprived of their nationality and declared ‘foreigners’, following the arbitrary and discriminatory National Registration Process. Those excluded can appeal to Foreigner Tribunals (FTs), which were put on hold during the pandemic. Many are also held in overcrowded detention centres, which lack COVID-19 prevention measures. Declared ‘foreigners’ have had ration cards revoked and cannot receive government food relief. They also did not receive other government relief packages and have limited access to healthcare. The costs involved in appealing citizenship cases have left people with weakened resilience and less able to afford healthcare. The Development and Justice Initiative, and newly formed Right to Nationality and Citizenship Network is supporting 40 stateless people to appeal their cases in the FTs, and has been advocating for access to social security provisions including subsidised food and pensions for elderly and disabled persons. Lack of awareness surrounding COVID-19 and related prevention measures is also an issue, and a Rohingya community project in India, is focussing on raising awareness, and distributing hygiene packages to the community.
THE ROADMAP
The upcoming report offers a practical 3-step roadmap as a framework for resolving and addressing the structural discrimination and exclusion of stateless persons, during times of COVID-19 and beyond.
Drawing on the experiences and expertise of Consortium members in their COVID-19 work, the Roadmap aims to inform and guide the necessary inclusive responses of multiple stakeholders, including governments, parliamentarians and political parties, professional bodies, NHRIs, regional organisations and bodies, UN Treaty Bodies and Special Procedures, diplomats, donors, UN agencies, humanitarian and development organisations, civil society organisations, grassroots groups, activists, the media and concerned members of the general public. The steps outlined in the Roadmap are:
- Check for institutional blind-spots, engage in careful introspection and review policies and practices to ensure that stateless people are not left behind.
- Include, Consult and Engage in dialogue with stateless people, to ensure fully inclusive responses.
- Build Back Better so that when ‘normalcy’ returns, there is a lasting commitment to breaking down the pervasive injustice, indignity, inequality, deprivation and exclusion that stateless people face.
BACKGROUND
Nationality is a ‘gateway’ right, meaning that it is often a prerequisite to access other rights and services, including healthcare, education, formal employment, and government support. Stateless people, who lack the nationality of any state, are generally excluded. During the pandemic, existing structural discrimination has been heightened and laid bare, and state and other actors’ responses have either directly or indirectly discriminated against the stateless. Now, with the rollout of the vaccine, the stakes are even higher, and exclusion from vaccination efforts may prove devastating – both on an individual level, but also from a public health perspective, as no one is safe, until everyone is safe. As the pandemic draws attention to these rights violations, there is also an opportunity to step-up engagement to defend stateless peoples’ rights.
By the Institute of Statelessness Inclusion and Rohingya Human Rights Initiative