Comments on Citizenship Provisions in the Draft Constitution 2072

 It is a state’s sovereign right to grant citizenship pursuant to its own criteria. A state’s criteria for granting citizenship should avoid statelessness. There is an absolute prohibition against discrimination. States must commit to respect the human rights of all citizens and noncitizens. Individuals should have a right of option to choose their citizenship. The acquisition of citizenship is based on an effective connection between the individual concerned and the territory. The options for acquiring citizenship include: (a) Residency (b) Birth (c) Naturalization. There is no firm rule on dual citizenship. States may take it or leave it. There is no requirement for reciprocal provisions with neighboring states. There is an absolute prohibition against forced deportations and evictions and states must respect the concept of non-refoulement. The granting of citizenship must respect property rights.

The ICCPR, CRC, and CEDAW and other international instruments recognize the right of states to exercise their sovereignty over matters pertaining to citizenship. At the same time, these agreements limit a state’s exercise of that right by carving out certain fundamental rights of individuals. Commonly protected individual rights include the right to a nationality, the right to be treated equally before the law, and the right to be free from discrimination. There is no explicit individual right to be free from statelessness, but it strongly discouraged in the international system.

Article 15(1) of Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides for a right to nationality, as does Article 24 of the ICCPR. Moreover, Article 1 of the ICCPR proclaims that all persons have the right of self-determination. Articles 7 and 9 of CRC and CEDAW, respectively, also guarantee the right to nationality but with the additional provision encouraging the avoidance of statelessness. Specifically, Article 9 of CEDAW mandates that states grant women equal rights with men to acquire, change, or retain their nationality; it further requires states to ensure that neither marriage nor unilateral acts of a woman’s husband will render the women or her children stateless.

The provisions of the draft constitution must be judged against these principles: