The Council of Europe Convention on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession is a

treaty A treaty is a formal, legally binding written agreement between actors in international law. It is usually made by and between sovereign states, but can include international organizations An international organization or international o ...

that aims to ensure that people are not left without a nationality when one or more states replace their state of

nationality Nationality is a legal identification of a person in international law, establishing the person as a subject, a ''national'', of a sovereign state. It affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the ...

. Such cases occur when individuals lose the nationality of the replaced state but do not acquire that of any replacing state. This convention builds on the

European Convention on Nationality The European Convention on Nationality (European Treaty Series, E.T.S. No. 166) was signed in Strasbourg on 6 November 1997. It is a comprehensive convention of the Council of Europe dealing with the law of nationality. The convention is open ...

to establish detailed rules to prevent these cases. In response to a growing risk of statelessness from a "wave" of state succession in

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...

in the 1990s and 2000s, the

United Nations General Assembly The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA or GA; french: link=no, Assemblée générale, AG) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations (UN), serving as the main deliberative, policymaking, and representative organ of the UN. Curr ...

encouraged states to consider developing legal instruments to regulate the ensuing issues of nationality. This treaty remains the only "positive response" to that encouragement.

Parties and signatories

Council_of_Europe_Convention_on_the_Avoidance_of_Statelessness_in_Relation_to_State_Succession_map

The treaty has seven states parties and two signatories that have not ratified. All are members of the

Council of Europe The Council of Europe (CoE; french: Conseil de l'Europe, ) is an international organisation founded in the wake of World War II to uphold European Convention on Human Rights, human rights, democracy and the Law in Europe, rule of law in Europe. ...

. In 2019, the

Commissioner for Human Rights The Commissioner for Human Rights is an independent and impartial non-judicial institution established in 1999 by the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, to promote awareness of and respect for human rights in the council's 46 member states. The ...

noted that many members had not joined international "instruments on statelessness and nationality", and "only seven" had joined this convention. The Commissioner urged members to do so as part of a campaign to eradicate statelessness.

References

External links

Text of the convention
Council of Europe treaties Human rights instruments Nationality treaties Statelessness Treaties concluded in 2006 Treaties entered into force in 2009 Treaties of Austria Treaties of Germany Treaties of Hungary Treaties of Luxembourg Treaties of Montenegro Treaties of the Netherlands Treaties of Norway Treaties of Moldova Treaties of Ukraine {{Treaty-stub