DUSHANBE, November 21, 2014, Asia-Plus — The Head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Office in Tajikistan, Mr. Kevin Allen, is expected to give a briefing in Dushanbe on December 8, 2014.
The UNHCR Office in Tajikistan says the briefing is devoted to the Launch of UNHCR Global Campaign aimed at ending within 10 years the problem of statelessness.
Mr. Allen will provide a brief overview of UNHCR activities globally as well as on local level and the issues that would need attention in Tajikistan with particular emphasis on the main milestones of activities such as support to stateless persons, the source noted.
According to data of the UN Refugee Agency, at least ten million people worldwide are currently stateless and a baby is born stateless every ten minutes. Not allowed a nationality, they are often denied the rights and services that countries normally offer their citizens.
For Central Asia there are reportedly 30,000 stateless people. There are two main causes statelessness in the region; the dissolution of USSR and cross-border movements and mixed marriages. There are many examples of States being proactive in ending statelessness in Central Asia. For example, in Kyrgyzstan, more than 65,000 former USSR citizens have acquired or confirmed their Kyrgyz citizenship since 2009. While Turkmenistan stands out for it monumental efforts to reduce and prevent statelessness. Kazakhstan is in the process of identification stateless persons, while Tajikistan has reformed nationality law, which is pending consideration by the Parliament.
UNHCR opened an office in Tajikistan in 1993, when the country was torn by civil war two years after the country declared its independence from the Soviet Union. That year, Tajikistan became the first country in Central Asia to accede to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol. It was also the first country in the region to adopt national refugee legislation. UNHCR has helped people displaced by the civil war to return home as well as assisting refugees.
In 2013, UNHCR has donated equipment and helped introduce new software that provided the Government of Tajikistan with a modern refugee registration system. The organization has also helped the Government to revise its citizenship law and participated in a working group that has amended the national refugee law. Both laws are now awaiting approval by Parliament.
