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Analytical Report
Regarding Stateless Persons in the Republic of Moldova
Drafted by: Olesea Cotoman
Maria Vremis
Iulian Popov
Chisinau 2017
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CONTENTS
Abbreviations .................................................................................................................................................. 4
I. INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 5
1.1 Report structure ......................................................................................................................... .....6
1.2 Basic definitions and scope of the study ......................................................................................... 6
1.3 Methodology ................................................................................................................................... 7
1.4 Statelessness as a global phenomenon .......................................................................................... 8
1.4.1 Causes of statelessness.........................................................................................................9
1.4.2 Consequences of statelessness...........................................................................................12
1.4.3 The role of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in solving statelessness
problems......................................................................................................................................13
II. DEMOGRAPHY OF STATELESSNESS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA ..................................................... 186
2.1 Data sources, gaps and challenges encountered in the data collection process ....................... 186
2.2. Statelessness Evolution in the Republic of Moldova ................................................................... 20
2.3 Current situation and the profile of a stateless person in the Republic of Moldova ................... 19
2.4. Situation assessment regarding undocumented people at the local level ................................ 284
III. DETERMINATION OF STATELESSNESS AND RIGHTS RELATING TO THE STATUS OF STATELESS PERSONS29
3.1 National legal framework .............................................................................................................. 29
3.2 Procedure on recognition of the status of stateless persons ....................................................... 30
3.2.1 Identification of stateless persons......................................................................................30
3.2.2 Competent authority..........................................................................................................30
3.2.3 Procedural aspects.............................................................................................................35
3.2.3.1 Access to the procedure..........................................................................................35
3.2.3.2 Procedural safeguards.............................................................................................353
3.2.3.3 The Interview...........................................................................................................35
3.2.3.4 The burden of proof................................................................................................35
3.2.3.5 Decision on the application for recognition of the status of stateless person........35
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3.2.3.6 Suspension and termination of the status recognition procedure for stateless
persons................................................................................................................................35
3.2.3.7 Termination and cancellation of stateless person status........................................35
3.2.3.8 Access to court........................................................................................................35
3.2.4 Procedure for establishing the identity of person.............................................................35
3.3 Rights of stateless persons and stateless persons recognized in the Republic of Moldova ......... 39
3.3.1 Rights of applicants for stateless status.............................................................................39
3.3.1.1 Detention.................................................................................................................40
3.3.1.2 Expulsion.................................................................................................................41
3.3.2 Fundamental rights, freedoms and duties of stateless persons.......................................42
3.3.3 Identity documents...........................................................................................................43
3.3.4 Procedural safeguards for minors....................................................................................44
IV. REDUCTION AND PREVENTION OF THE STATELESSNESS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA ..................... 57
4.1. The national legal framework of the Republic of Moldova on the right to citizenship and the reduction of
statelessness ....................................................................................................................................... 57
4.2. Acquisition and loss of citizenship according to the legislation of the Republic of Moldova and its
compatibility with international standards ........................................................................................ 59
4.3. Reducing the cases of statelessness.............................................................................................5259
V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS (Experts: Olesea Cotoman, Iulian Popov, Maria Vermis) ..... 65
BIBLIOGRAPHY .............................................................................................................................................. 69
ANNEXES ....................................................................................................................................................... 60
Annex 1 INTERVIEW GUIDE (LPA, decision-makers) ........................................................................... 60
Annex 2 INTERVIEW GUIDE (natural persons) .................................................................................... 73
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Abbreviations
PSA Public Services Agency
BMA of MIA Bureau for Migration and Asylum under Ministry of Internal Affairs
NBS National Bureau of Statistics
LCA Law Center of Advocates
UNHCR United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
PHC Population and Housing Census
UN United Nations
UNICEF United Nations Children's Fund
UNIFEM United Nations Development Fund for Women
ILO International Labour Organization
UNDP United Nations Development Programme
WFP World Food Programme
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I. INTRODUCTION
Statelessness is recognized as a particularly vulnerable phenomenon, and the identification of stateless
persons, of their profile, as well of possibilities to provide then protection and to integrate them into the society
is very actual in the context of continual growth of the migration phenomenon.
Lately, the interest in the statelessness phenomenon has constantly grown. This tendency reflects the
increase in the degree of awareness of the fact that statelessnesss can have detrimental consequences on the
lives of individuals and communities. Statelessness can also tension the interstate relations, an example being
the fact that it can lead to forced displacement of people. Moreover, statelessness is a really global problem
and no region has remained unaffected.
Due to the increasing attention from states, civil society, international community and affected population
paid to this issue, significant progress was registered lately regarding the prevention of statelessness and
solving the existing situations.
With the accession to the Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, addopted in New York
on September 28th 19541 and to the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, concluded in New York
on August 30th 19612, the Republic of Moldova has committed to contribute to the regulation and
improvement of the status of stateless persons, as well as to contribute to the reduction of cases of statelessness
within the country.
So, upon accession to the mentioned conventions, Law No. 200 of 16.06.2010 regarding the regime of
foreigners in the Republic of Moldova3 was modified and completed and a legal mechanism for determination
of the status of a stateless person was established. The Republic of Moldova is one of the few countries around
the world, that implements the procedure of recognition of the status of a stateless person at a national level.
The statistical data reflect an increase in the number of stateless persons in the Republic of Moldova.
According to the Public Services Agency, in 2016 there were 1972 persons documented with a statelessness
staatus, maintaining a pretty imposing ratio of 8.8 percent in the structure of foreigners. At the same time, due
to the lack of information, people might not identify themselves as stateless, fact that emphasizes the
importance and necessity of studies and researches in the concerned field, for a better mapping of the situation
regarding statelessness, the legislative-normative coverage of the respective group, as well offering
information on the possible gaps, needs for involvement aiming at preventing and reducing statelessness.
At national level, the mandate of some institutions includes statelessness, a Memorandum of
unterstanding in this sense was signed between the Bureau for Migration and Asylum under the Ministry of
1Law No. 275 as of 27.12.2011 for the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the Convention relating to the Status of Stateless
Persons, http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=342052 2Law No. 252 as of 08.12.2011 for the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=341953 3 Chapter X1 Law No. 200 as of 16.06.2010 regarding the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=336056
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Internal Affairs, the National Council for State Guaranteed Legal Aid and the Public Association "Law Center
of Advocates"4, that agreed to organize legal assistance for foreign citizensd stateless persons by organizing
and offering of state guaranteed legal aid and by diminishing economic and financial impediments through
realisation of access to justice.
Currently, the Law Center of Advocates (LCA) implements the project "Providing legal aid assistance to
stateless persons in the Republic of Moldova", financed by the Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the Republic of Moldova, that aims at reducing the number of
stateless persons, inclusive of persons with "undetermined citizenship" and of people at risk of becoming
stateless.
In line with the project objective, LCA decided to conduct the present research,that aims at the
development of a Legislative Analytical Report regarding the situation of stateless persons in the Republic
of Moldova.
1.1 Report structure
The analytical report contains six informative-analytical chapters, with a summary as follows:
Chapter I Introduction contains information regarding the report structure, definitions and objectives of
the study, as well as the applied methodology. The chapter also includes some information on theoretical
aspects regarding the notion of a stateless person, analyzes the causes of statelessness and the consequences
to which it leads, as well as the role of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in solving
statelessness problems.
Chapter II presents the existing data sources for the analysis of the situation in the field, reflects the state
of affairs regarding the phenomenon evolution and analyzes the current condition and profile of the statelesss
person in Moldova in different disaggregations.
Chapter III analyzes the legilative framework applied in the Republic of Moldova for identification of
stateless persons, the definition of a stateless person, the legal framework determining the status of a stateless
person, as well as the legislative-normative situation in the country in relation to the international one.
Chapter IV is dedicated to the analysis of the situation regarding the prevention of statelessness and the
reduction of statelessness at national, regional and international levels. The legal framework on protection of
stateless persons is examined, as well as the right to citizenship, reduction of statelessness cases, rights and
obligations of stateless persons according to the legislative-normative framework in the country.
Chapter V provides testimonies of stateless persons and people exposed to the risk of statelessness in the
Republic of Moldova.
Chapter VI presents conclusions resulted from the performed analysis and a set of recommendations to
the examined subject.
4http://old.bma.gov.md/content/6930
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The report ends up with a series of annexes that include statistical tables, instruments of data collection,
etc.
1.2 Basic definitions and scope of the study
Definitions. The report operates with a series of definitions that determine the respective phenomenon,
applied to the national and international levels, namely:
stateless person - person who is not considered a citizen by any state owing to its legislation5;
foreigner - person who has no nationality of the Republic of Moldova or is doesn't have a citizenship6;
persons with undetermined citizenship - persons in regards of whom, as a result of performed
verifications, there could not be determined whether they hold any citizenship or are stateless. This status was
previously attributed by the PSA untill 28.12.2011 when the procedure for recognition of the statelessness
status was introduced by Law No.284.
persons without citizenship - people that don't hold the citizenship of any state (stateless persons). Usually,
these are people who gave up on the citizenship they held, without acquiring the citizenship of another state
for various reasons. People without citizenship may originate from other states, as well as from the Republic
of Moldova7 (notion used in the context of the Population and Housing Census from the Republic of Moldova
in 2014);
legal and regular domicile – legal residence of a person for an undetermined period of time on the basis
of official documents issues by the authorities of the receiving state8.
applicant for a statelessness status – person that has applied for the recognition of the statelessness status,
which has not been solved yet by irrevocable decision;
refugee status - form of protection, recognized by the Republic of Moldova, of the foreign citizen or of a
stateless person, who meets the conditions provided by the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees,
adopted in Geneva on July 28th 1951, as well as by the Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees of January
31st 1967;
asylum applicant - foreigner that has submitted an application for asylum, that has not been solved yet by
irrevocable decision;
international protection – the statuses of the refugee and the status provided by humanitarian protection,
according to the provisions of Law No. 270 of 18.12.2008 regardins asylum in the Republic of Moldova;
5 Art. 3 Law No. 200 as of 16.06.2010 regarding the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=336056 6Ibid. 7 Census staff manual, National Bureau of Statistics of the Republic of Moldova, Population and Housing Center 2014, Chisinau
2014, p. 56, http://www.statistica.md/public/files/Recensamint/Recensamint_pop_2014/Manual_RPL2014_rom.pdf 8 Art. 1 Law on Citizenship of the Republic of Moldova No. 1024 as of 02 June 2000,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=311522
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asylum procedure – set of the performed operations and actions, and also the activities performed by
competent authorities for the purpose of provision of one of protection forms in the territory of the Republic
of Moldova;
unaccompanied minor– the foreigner aged up to 18 years, who arrives onto the territory of the Republic
of Moldova without being accompanied by an adult who is responsible for him according to the law or to the
legal act until he is really not given to care of such person; this notion designates also the minor, who was left
unaccompanied after the arrival onto the territory of the Republic of Moldova.
Scope of the study. The result of the performed analysis within the present report offers a general
presentation of the international legal framework regarding statelessness, presents the profile of stateless
persons, analyzes the institutional and legal framework of the Republic of Moldova regarding the right to
citizenship, prevention of statelessness, reduction of statelessness cases and protection of stateless persons, as
well as serves to the further consolidation of the Republic of Moldova Government's to identify, prevent and
reduce statelessness cases in the Republic of Moldova.
1.3 Methodology
In the report were applied the following research methods: (i) documentary analysis, (ii) quantitative
analysis, (iii) qualitative analysis, (iv) legal research.
Documentary analysis is applied at the initial stage of preparation for the research. The documentary
sources that were investigated can be grouped into the following categories:
1) National and international legislative and normative acts of regulatory and methodological nature in
the field (human rights, migration, statelessness, etc);
2) Analytical reports carried out in the field of study;
3) Relative related documents: (i) monographies, specialist articles; (ii) document collections, etc.
The list of documentary sources used in the analysis is presented in the bibliography;
The quantitative analysis focused on available data held by national structures regarding the concerned
phenomenon, national and international statistics, relevant indicators used for the evaluation of the situation
and of the stateless person's profile, other data, statistical indicators, requested and used in the report for a
broad overview of the situation. Thus, statistical data collection used in the report was conducted by directly
contacting the data banks of relevant institutions, respectively the Bank of statistical data of the National
Bureau of Statistics9, public data from the State Register of Population of the Public Services Agency10,
Government Open Data Portal11, also additional necessary data were requested from the Public Services
9http://statbank.statistica.md/pxweb/pxweb/ro/20%20Populatia%20si%20procesele%20demografice/20%20Populatia%20si%20pr
ocesele%20demografice__POP010/?rxid=2345d98a-890b-4459-bb1f-9b565f99b3b9 10http://www.asp.gov.md/date-statistice/in-profil-administrativ-teritorial 11http://date.gov.md/ckan/ro/organization/1138-ministerul-afacerilor-interne
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Agency, The Bureau for Migration and Asylum of the Ministry for Internal Affairs. At the same time, data
from diferent analytical reports of the Bureau for Migration and Asylum, UNHCR, other national and
international structures were used, references for which were indicated in the context of the report.
The qualitative analysis included information collected by means of two interviewing guides for the
evaluation of the information regarding statelessness at local level (i) Interviewing Guide (Local Public
Administration, decision factors) (Annex Nr. 1) and (ii) Interviewing Guide (natural persons), developed for
this purpose (both in the annex), as well as interviews conducted with the persons targeted by the research
(Annex Nr.2).
Legal research included a deep analysis of the national and international legislation, as well of the
compatibility of the national legislation with the 1954 Convention related to the Status of Stateless Persons
and the 1961 Convention on Reduction of Statelessness, other legislative and normative aspects referring to
the field of study.
1.4 Statelessness as a global phenomenon
A 1949 UN published study describes statelessness as an "abnormality" that creates "a state of affairs
incompatible with a healthy conception of the law"12.
Similarly, UNHCR described stateless persons as "those excluded from the global political system of
states" or "non-persons / legal ghosts"13.
Article 1 (1) of the Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons, adopted on 28 September 1954 at New
York, defines the notion of a stateless person as follows: "For the purpose of this Convention, the term
"stateless person" means a person who is not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its
law".
The Convention doesn't allow formulation of reservations to the provisions of this Article, and, for this
reason, this definition is taken over by all the states-parties to the Convention. Also, the International Law
Commission has concluded, that the definition provided in Article 1 (1) of the Convention is part of the
customary international law14.
As can be noticed, this is a generally-accepted definition by the international law and that was later also
transposed in the 1961 Convention on Reduction of Statelessness.
Basically, a person is considered a citizen by birth, this being regulated by different legal instruments (as
the Constitution, the Law on Citizenship or other normative acts) of the state where the person was born or of
which citizens are his/her parents. However, not everyone receives citizenship at birth by application of law.
Some remain without citizenship after it has been withdrawn. They are, generally, called de-jure stateless
12A Study of Statelessness, United Nations, Lake Success - New York, August 1949, p. 8.
http://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae68c2d0.html 13 UNHCR, The World’s Stateless People: Questions and Answers.2006, p. 5. 14 UNHCR. Guidelines on Statelessness No. 1: The definition of "Stateless Person" in Article 1(1) of the 1954 Convention relating
to the Status of Stateless Persons, p. 12.
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persons and constitute the main subject of concern according to the Convention regarding the status of stateless
people.
Thus, stateless persons de jure are persons, who are not nationals of any State, either because at birth or
subsequently they were not given any nationality, or because during their lifetime they lost their own
nationality and did not acquire a new one15.
Another category of stateless persons is composed of a group of people who, though were not withdrawn
the citizenship, for some reasons cannot enjoy the protection and assistance of national authorities abroad.
This group doesn't have an effective form of nationality and falls under the category of stateless persons de
facto. Similar problems might occur also in the case of people holding the citizenship of a state, but for some
reasons are not allowed to enter or to keep their residence in this state.
Stateless persons de facto are persons who, having left the country of which they were nationals, no longer
enjoy the protection and assistance of their national authorities, either because these authorities refuse to grant
them assistance and protection, or because they themselves renounce the assistance and protection of the
countries of which they are nationals16.
1.4.1 Causes of statelessness
The stateless person is a person who " is not considered as a national by any State under the operation of
its law". There are multiple ways in which a person can become stateless, for example, as a result of direct
discrimination of some ethnicities, this fact being stipulated expressly in the law, as well as structural
discrimination that can also be an indirect form of discrimination, but which nevertheless limits the possibility
of natural persons to have a citizenship.
It is also usefull a distinction to be done between the primary and secondary sources of statelessness.
Primary sources refer to direct discrimination and include:
a) denial and deprivation of citizenship;
b) loss of citizenship.
Secondary sources refer to the context in which national policies are developed, interpreted and applied,
including:
a) political restructuring;
b) practical barriers that prevent people from access to their rights.
Also, it can be argued that some forms of discrimination, such as gender law, can be both primary and
secondary causes of statelessness17.
15A Study of Statelessness, United Nations, Lake Success - New York, August 1949, p. 7. 16 Ibid, p. 7. 17 Brad K. Blitz. Statelessness, protection and equality. Forced Migration Policy Briefing 3. University of Oxford. September 2009,
p. 1.
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Therewith, UNHCR in its turn enumerates a series of causes that can lead to statelessness, such as: conflict
between laws, land transfer, laws regarding marriage, administratie practices, discrimination, laws referring
to birth registration, blood rights, denationalization and automatic loss of citizenship provided for by law.
Further some of the most important factors that can lead to statelessness will be analyzed, and namely:
a) Succession of states
Succession of states is a process, that affects not only political geography, but also population distribution.
The successed state has to define itself by defining its land and population. The latter happens through the
development of policies and of the legislation regarding citizenship, that determine who are the members of
the new state and confer the status of a citizen. In this context, the state has to deal with such definitions as
identity and belonging. History shows us that the redrawing of borders has constituted the main source of
statelessness for separate individuals or entire groups that didn’t fall within the legal provisions related to the
citizenship of the successed state or states18.
b) Gender discrimination
Traditionally women had a more disadvantaged position or ina more dependent one according to the
provisions of the Law on Citizenship, due to the principle of "dependence on nationality" or "unity of family
citizenship". This principle resulted from the belief of states that all the members of a family should be of
same nationality, as well as that the nationality of the male family member should be decisive for all the people
related to him. In this way, a woman received the citizenship of her husband, and the citizenship is transmitted
from father to child, thus the family citizenship unity being ensured. This approach to women was largely
accepted in the first half of the XXth century – in fact, it was to some extent officially recognized by
international law of those times and which did nothing to prevent (and perhaps even encouraged) the adoption
of laws regarding citizenship that discriminated women19.
Indeed, the prohibition of gender discrimination on grounds of citizenship is expressly included in Art. 9
of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, adopted on 18
December 1979, that stipulates that "The States parties will grant women equal rights with men in terms of
acquiring, changing or retaining citizenship. They will particularly guarantee, that neither marriage to a
foregner, nor the change of the spouse’s citizenship during amrriage will not automatically lead to the change
of the woman’s citizenship, won’t make her stateless and will not force her to take her husband’s citizenship".
Similarly, point 2 of Article 9 mentions that: "The States parties will grant women equal rights with men
regarding the citizenship of their children"20. Discrimination prohibition is also provided for in the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and in the Convention on the Rights of the Child. As a
18Laura van Waas. The situation of stateless persons in the Middle East and North Africa. 2010, p. 6.
19 Ibid, p. 10. 20Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, adopted on 18 December 1979. The Republic
of Moldova accessed it through the Parliament Decision of the Republic of Moldova No. 87-XII as of 28 April 1994. In force for
the Republic of Moldova starting 31 July 1994, Art. 9, http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/cedaw.htm
12
result, a large majority of states modified their national legislations, so as to eliminate any gender
discrimination, offering to women equal rights with men regarding citizenship, inclusive of the one of their
children.
c) Rasial, ethnic and religious discrimination
Among the most problematic elements of the law on citizenship in some states of Africa is that they focus
on ethnical or racial elements when granting citizenship. Thus, some states restricted the access of certain
ethnic groups that can never obtain a citizenship by birth. Some of the most extremist states such as Liberia
and Sierra Leone, founded by liberated sclaves, took such a position according to which only those of "negroid
origin" can become citizens by birth. In Sierra Leone there are also more restrictive norms for the
naturalization of those of different race from the "negroid origin", while in Liberia descendents of other races
not only can not acquire citizenship by birth, but "with the aim of preserving, promoting and maintaining
Liberian culture, values and character" are also prohibited to become citizens even through naturalization21.
Another example is the 1982 Law on Citizenship of Burma, according to which citizens with full rights
were considered only thoose persons, who belong to one of the 135 "national races" established in Burma (
Myanmar Union) before 1823. Thus, as a result of the adoption of this law, the majority of persons originating
from India and China, among them also people of "Rohingya" orign, whose number was estimated to 72500022
were deprived of citizenship.
d) Migration
Migration represents a historical phenomenon developing all over the world. When migration transcends
international borders, it raises interesting and, sometimes, difficult questions in regards of citizenship granting.
Thus, international migration contributes to a greater mix of persons, what can lead to the increase of the
number of mixed marriages, rising questions regarding the citizenship of children born in such kinds of unions.
At the same time, with the movement of people from one country to another one, the question arises what
impact does migration have on the citizenship of these people that leave and what access do immigrants have
on the citizenship of the receiving country. In the case, when this migration is a continuous one, same as in
the situation of nomadic groups, the problem of their belonging to the citizenship of a state becomes more
complex and increases the risk of statelessness. Moreover, there could exist stateless persons in motion, like,
for example, between 1990-1991 during the Persian Gulf War, about 100.000 and 240.000 of stateless bedoons
left Kuwait settelling down mostly in Iraq without being able to return somewhen23.
Similarly, problems related to citizenship and statelessness appeared in the context of numerous migratory
movements. As an example can sere the bedoon tribes from the Middle East, whose nomadic way of life
impeded their access to citizenship during the period of development of states from this region between 50’’-
70’’ of the XXth century and who remained stateless. In this way, in Lebanon, only the bedoons that could
21Bronwen Manby. Citizenship Law in Africa a Comparative Study. Open Society Foundations, 2010, p.3. 22Lewa Chris. North Arakan: an open prison for the Rohingya in Burma. Forced migration, number 32, 2009, p.11. 23 Shiblak A. Arabia’s Bidoon, Statelessness and the benefits of citizenship: A comparative study, B. Blitz (ed.), 2009. p.88.
13
prove they live "in a normal way" in Lebanon were considered Lebanese, fact that led to the exclusion of an
unknown number of Muslim Sunni bedoons from acquiring citizenship, because they could not demonstrate
their residence. Thus, some of them managed to obtain the citizenship of Lebanon thanks to a special decree
on naturalization from 1994. Another nomadic community that was afected by statelessness are those more
than 15.000 Mauritanian nomads that were out of the country, when the State of Mauritania adopted a policy
of denatiolising certain segments of population as a result of the ethnic conflict in the country within 1989-
1990. Being caught outside the country, they were prohibited to to enter the country, because the authorities
withdrew their Mauritanian citizenship24.
Special attention should be paid to children born by migrants, forced displaced persons and to their risk
of being stateless. An additional concern is the one that children born within nomadic communities may face
difficulties regarding birth registration, as is the case of Algeria. Indeed, the birth registration rates are much
lower among nomadic communities, as well as among migrants and forced displaced people.
e) Simple obstacles – imposibility of birth registration, administrative practices
Failure or imposibility of registering children at birth is a major problem for many developing countries,
that leads to the imposibility of proving the children’s birth, place of birth, who are their parents or citizens of
which country are their parents, as well as their origin. The record means a proof of legal identity. Similarly,
it is vital for ensuring recognition before the law, protection of rights, such as those related to inheritance, and
also makes children less vulnerable to abuse and exploitation, especially in the case they are separated from
their parents.
Articles 7 and 8 of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted on 20 November
1989 at New York, declare that national governments should register children immediately after birth and that
children have the right to acquire a citizenship from birth. The Convention mention that the states shoud grant
citizenship to children born in their country, if the child were to be stateless25.
According to international law, every child has the right for his/her birth registration, inclusive of those
born by irregular migrants, thus there are various problems in practice egarding the implementation of these
provisions, leaving many children stateless. According to the UNICEF data, 230 million of children up to the
age of 5 were not registered at birth26. The most representative states in this sense are form the African, Asian,
East-Asian countries, as well as those from Pacific Region. The reasons why parents don't register their
children from birth are: lack of awareness of the importance of children birth registration, costs in terms of
time and money for registering a newborn, long distance to the registration office,uncertainty that the child
will survive, political disturbances, social and legal barriers, fear of persecution, etc. Researches conducted in
24Laura van Waas. The situation of stateless persons in the Middle East and North Africa. 2010, p.15.
25The International Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted on 20 November 1989 at New York. The Republic of Moldova
accessed it through the Decision of the Parliament No. 408-XII as of 12.12.90. Published in the official edition of "International
Treaties", 1998, volume 1, Art.7-8. 26 UNICEF, Every child’s birth right Inequities and trends in birth registration, December 2013, p.14-15,
https://www.un.org/ruleoflaw/files/Embargoed_11_Dec_Birth_Registration_report_low_res.pdf
14
the Dominican Republic showed that the non-granting of citizenship to children of Haitian origin through the
rejection of the registration of their birth created numerous cases of statelessness. At the same time, in some
states like Zambia that is assaulted by poverty, HIV and AIDS or Nepal where the mortality rate of children
is very high, the registry of children's birth seems not to have any importance for parents, especially for its
high cost27.
There are various administrative and procedural aspects regarding the acquiring, re-acquiring and loss of
nationality. Even if a person is eligible for gaining a citizenship - indeed, even if a person has successfully
applied for citizenship - excessive administrative taxes, deadlines that cannot be respected or/and the
incapacity of providing the necessary documents, because there are in the possession of the former state of
nationality, alltogether can prevent a person from acquiring nationality28.
Moreover, besides political restructuring, statelessness can be caused by climate change and environment
related displacement, fact highlighted in 2009, at the UN Conference on Climate Change. The report of the
intergovernmental group of experts on climate change (IPCC) elucidated the facct that the Netherlands,
Guyana and Bangladesh, as well as a number of oceanic islands are threatened by the sea level rise (IPCC
2008). The report mentioned thata about 600 million of people could be affected by the effects of sea level
rise before the end of the 21st century and could be forced to leave their countries of origin, suggesting that
statelessness could be caused as a result of physical desinteration of states29.
1.4.2 Consequences of statelessness
In order to understand the disadvantages of statelessness we, first of all, need to understand the advantage
offered by the quality of being a citizen of a state. First of all it is necessary to mention that within the interstatal
relations, the state is entitled to extend its diplomatic protection to its citizens, protecting them even outside,
also the state is obliged to receive/admit people who hold its citizenship. In the same way, citizens are given
the priority rights of immigration, residence, voting, public service positions, social security, acces to labour
market, as well as other rights.
At the same time, the lack of citizenship in daily life can become very complex and full of legal and
administrative obstacles. Without a nationality it is difficult to define one's legal status in society, to register
with local authorities, to obtain an identity document necessary for access to social and medical services, to
education, and also to get a job. Another obvious consequence is the difficulty of obtaining any kind of national
passport or travel document. They are particularly vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, inclusive of the risk
of being trafficked, forced into a sexual exploitation, imprisoned with adults and deported. As we can see, the
problem of statelessness among children creates a series of negative consequences for them, and namely:
27 Cody Claire and Heap Simon. The Universal Birth Registration campaign. Forced Migration Review, Number 32, 2009, p.21. 28Achiron Marilyn. Nationality and Statelessness: Manual for Parliamentarians. Bucharest: Official Monitor R.A., 2010, p.27. 29 Brad K. Blitz and Maureen Lynch. Statelessness and the Benefits of Citizenship: A Comparative Study. Oxford Brookes
Univerşity, UK, June 2009, p.9.
15
a) No legal identity
Without a citizenship and a legally certified identity, stateless children are less likely to be registered at
birth or to be recognized otherwise and receive protection from the state. Children without documents
certifying their name, age and origin are hard to be tracked in case they are left or disappear, or if they are
separated from their parents during emergency. Orphaned children, for example, may be deprived of the right
to claim their inheritance, if their identity cannot be proved.
b) No access to helthcare services
Even before birth, statelessness can have an impact on the child's chance of surviving. If the mother is
stateless, she cannot ahve access to prenatal care or cannot get help during labor and delivery. Once the child
is born, mother is not entitled to postnatal care and may be refused the access to healthcare services for herself
and her child. In many states stateless children cannot be legally vaccinated. Also, civil status documents are
to be provided for a child to be taken care of in a medical institution30.
c) Exclusion from education system
Children without a citizenship are often exckuded from the education system. Even when they are able to
go to primary school, they could still be refusedto pass the state examinations and, respectively, being
restricted from access to secondary education, making them more vulnerable to exploitation. At the same time,
social programmes rarely extend to stateless communities. Because it is difficult to get a legal job and,
respectively, a source of income, stateless persons are caught in the poverty trap, and their efforts to strengthen
social welfare and child protection systems have little impact on stateless children, who are unable to get
access to them.
d) No protection from violence and abuse
Stateless children are more vulnerable to violence, abuse and exploitation. They can be recruited or used
by the armed forces or other groupings as soldiers or "wives"31. Stateless girls can be sold as brides or be
forced to enter an early marriage. In particular, they are victims of human traffiking and get into sexual
exploitation or end up as workers on the internal market in conditions equal to slavery. Children without
citizenship, that are victims of violence or abuse, often have a more restricted access to protection services
and are frequently left unprotected, exploited and abused.
e) Vulnerability to exploitation by traffickers and smugglers
Generally, stateless children cannot obtain a national passport and only few of them have documents
permitting them to travel. Being unable to travel legally and safely, they are often open to exploitation by
traffickers and smugglers. Smugglers use statelessness as a weapon for intimidation of children and teenagers,
30UNICEF. Birth Registration: The “first” right. 1998. http://www.unicef.org/pon98/06-13.pdf. 31UNICEF. Birth Registration and Armed Conflict. 2007,
http://www.unicef.org/protection/birth_registration_and_armed_conflict(1).pdf
16
threatening them with the fact that they will be put under arrest, if they report the trafficants' actions. Even
when children don't get into another country, they are forced to "hide" or risk to be arrested and exiled.
1.4.3. The role of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in solving statelessness problems
UNHCR has been involved in the problem of statelessness and of stateless persons since the beginning
of its activity in 1950. Over the years, the role of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in
support of the statelessness level reduction and in assisting stateless persons increased direct proportionally
to the development of the organization itself. Its activity in the field of statelessness is amndated by an
international treaty, by resolutions of the General Assembly of the UN and by reccomendations of the
organization's advisory body, Executive Committee of the High Commissioner's Programme (ExCom)32.
It is important to mention that the 1954 Convention relating to the status of stateless persons dose not
contain express provisions regarding the necessity of creation of a responsible bodyfor the promotion and
protection of rights of the stateless persons. At the same time, Article 11 of the 1961 Convention on the
Reduction of Statelessness stipulates the necessity of "establishment within the framewotk of the United
Nations [...] of a body to which a person claiming the benefit of this Convention may apply for the examination
of his claim and for assistance in presenting it to the appropriate authority". As a result, in 1974 the General
Assembly of the UN requested UNHCR to assume this role33.
Afterwards, the General Assembly of the UN encouraged UNHCR through its resolutions to continue
activities on behalf of stateless persons emerging from its attributions, as well as requested from UNHCR to
actively promote accession to the 1954 and 1961 Conventions and their implementation.
1995, the Executive Committee of the High Commissioner’s Programme adopted a comprehensive set of
guidelines on statelessness: Conclusions on Prevention and eduction of Statelessness (Conclusion No. 78).
The 1995 ExCom Conclusion on Statelessness "to continue its activities on behalf of stateless persons" and
"requests UNHCR actively to promote accession to the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless
Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness". The ExCom Conclusion also requests
UNHCR "to actively promote the prevention and reduction of statelessness through the dissemination of
information, and the training of staff and government officials; and to enhance cooperation with other
interested organizations"34.
In 2006, the General Assembly requested UNHCR to continue its work on the " Identification, Prevention
and Reduction of Statelessness and Protection of Stateless Persons". These four domains govern today the
efforts of UNHCR related to statelessness.
Statelessness identification includes continuous efforts of establishing the stateless population and
32Achiron Marilyn. Nationality and Statelessness: Manual for Parliamentarians. Bucharest: Official Monitor R.A., 2010, p.43. 33 UN General Assembly resolutions 3274 (XXIX), 10 December 1974, https://documents-dds-
ny.un.org/doc/RESOLUTION/GEN/NR0/738/76/IMG/NR073876.pdf?OpenElement 34Achiron Marilyn. Nationality and Statelessness: Manual for Parliamentarians. Bucharest: Official Monitor R.A., 2010, p.43.
17
dissemination of researches regarding the statistical data on this category of people; conducting and
dissemination of researches on causes, field of application and consequences of statelessness "for promoting
a better understanding of the nature and amplitude of this phenomenon, identification of stateless populations
and understanding the reasons that led to statessness, all these serving as a basis for the elaboration of
strategies for solving the issue".
The UNHCR mandate is not limited to resoling cases of statelessness that already hapened. It also
includes prevention, i.e. identification and finding an approach for the risks of statelessness that might affect
the population, especially by supporting the neccesay legislative changes. In this context, UNHCR particularly
provides technical and conciliation services related to the preparation and implementation of legilation
regarding nationality and promotes accession to the 1961 Convention.
Moreover, UNHCR calls upon member states to reduce statelessness, inter alia by advocating for the
adoption of "measures to enable people integrate in situations of prolonged statelessness", for "the right of
every child to acquire a citizenship, especially in the case of children" and by the diffusion of "information on
the access to citizenship"35.
Also, over the years UNHCR actively inolved in promotion of the cause of statelessness, in this sense
campaigns like "The UNHCR Action to Address Statelessness: A Strategy Note" (2010)36, "Global Action
Plan to End Statelessness" (2014)37.
UNHCR actively cooperates also with the main UN Agencies for solving the statelessness problem,
namely with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Children's Fund
(UNICEF) and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). In addressing prolonged
statelessness situations UNHCR also sometimes collaborates with the International Labor Organization (ILO),
the United Nations Deelopment Program (UNDP) and the World Food Program (WFP), by a mutual
implementation of some educational, accomodation or income generating in order to support the marginalized
communities for integration or reintegration into national society.
UNHCR cooperates with regional bodies, as the Council of Europe, the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe, the Organization of American States, the African Union, the League of Arab States
and the Organization of the Islamic Conference. UNHCR is a member of the Citizenship Committee of the
Council of Europe, that develops standards-enhancing instruments, as the European Convention on
Nationality and the draft Protocol on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession.38
35UNHCR., Mapping statelessness in the United Kingdom, London 2011, p.27. 36 UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), UNHCR Action to Address Statelessness: A Strategy Note, March
2010, available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/4b9e0c3d2.html 37 UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Global Action Plan to End Statelessness, 4 November 2014, available at:
http://www.refworld.org/docid/545b47d64.html 38Achiron Marilyn. Nationality and Statelessness: Manual for Parliamentarians. Bucharest: Official Monitor R.A., 2010, p.43.
18
II. DEMOGRAPHY OF STATELESSNESS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA
2.1 Data sources, gaps and challenges encountered in the data collection process
The main databases that generally serve as sources of population data, inclusive of information regarding
stateless persons, are held by several institutions as follows:
- National Bureau of Statistics (NBS),
- Public Services Agency (PSA),
- Bureau for Migration and Asylum (BMA) of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA),
- United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), (www.statistica.md), represents the central administrative
authority that manages and coordinates the activity in the field of statistics in the country, including the field
of migration. The main source that provides data about the population’s citizenship is the Population and
Housing Census (PHC). In Moldova, the census constitutes currently the only source of data on the
composition of the resident population in terms of general demographic characteristics, as well as of specific
characteristics as citizenship and country of birth. The last PHS was conducted during 12–25 May 2014, by
the collection of data and information on population and housing in the census questionnaires, approved by
the NBS. In thecensus there were collected data on: (i) the number of population, including the number of
people who left the country by period and purpose; territorial distribution of population; demographic and
aconomic characteristics and the degree of education of the population; (ii) the housing and buildings for
dwelling fund; as well as the living conditions39.
Also the PHC presents data on population by its citizenship, including the indicator regarding the group
of persons called without citizenship. The respective indicator is presented by residence areas (urban/ rural),
large age groups (0-17 years, 18-64 years, 65+ years), genders (female/male). The gaps and challenges the
census faced (and does usually face) could, in particular, influence the evidence of respective people, being
one of the most vulnerable groups in this context.
The Public Services Agency (PSA), (www.asp.gov.md) ensures the establishment, maintainance,
preservation, use and management of a considerable number of national registers, among which the State
Register of Population, and also ensures the the operation of department registers, guaranteeing the
monitorization of information systems and ressources and applying informational technology for the
management of the migration flow as holder of the State Register of Population.
The Public Services Agency provides statistical data on intenational migration, both on the stock and the
migration flow of Moldovan citizens (inclusive of those domiciled in the Transnistrian Region that are
registered upon adressing for documentation) and on immigrants documented with: (i) permanent residence
39http://www.statistica.md/pageview.php?l=ro&idc=479&
19
permits; (iii) ID cards for stateless persons, inclusive of those with travel documents for staeless persons
(including the cases of foreign children).
Data on population can be provided in various disaggregations as age, genders, etc. Information on
stateless persons who were granted a citizenship during 2000-2016 is also available.
The reevaluation of data for the Extended Migration Profile of the Republic of Moldova, realized in 2016,
underlined that there are not included into the database such categories of citizens that: (i) renounced on
mecanical readable identity documents from religious reasons (parishioners); (ii) live on the terrirory of the
Administrative-Territorial Unit of the left Bank of the Dniester River (Transnistria) and did not address for
the documentation with identity documents from the National Passport System; (iii) live on the territory of the
Administrative-Territorial Unit of the left Bank of the Dniester River (Transnistria) and hold civil status
documents issued after 1992 that authorities don’t recognize.
However, although progress has been reached in documenting with identity documents of the new model
of older people aged over 65 in exchange for the Soviet-type passports (model 1974), whose validity expired
on 1 September 2015, about 9.000 of people have failed to be documented.
The Bureu for Migration and Asylum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (BMA al MIA),
(www.bma.gov.md), created in July 2006 is an administrative authority responsible for the policy
implementation in the field of migration and asylum, for the management of the migration phenomenon by
the adminssion and documentation of foreigners with ID documents, for the recognition of the statelessness
status, for provision of humanitarian protection, for the coordination of the integration process of foregners in
the Republic of Moldova, for the control of the lawfullness of the foreigners’ stay on the territory of the
country, fot the public custody and corresponding application of removal measures and of respective
measures40.
Beginning 2013, BMA of MIA is responsible for the development of the Extended Migration Profile41
and of the Analytical Report Risk Analysis in the field of Migration and Asylum. Also, BMA represents an
important source of data, being the manager of the Integrated Automated Information System in the field of
migration and asylum, that includes a database with several registers that contain data on: (i) immigration; (ii)
asylum; (iii) statelessness; (iii) repatriation; (iv) invitations and (v) contraventions etc. BMA places eight sets
of data extracted from the system within the Government Portal of Open Data (www.date.gov.md )42. Data
can be obtained by ages, genders, country of origin.
40 Regulations on the performance and functioning, of the structure and staff limit of the MBA under the MIA, approved by GD No.
914 as of 07.11.2014. 41 Government Decision No. 634 as of 24.08.2012 on the approval of the Indicators’ List and of the Draft Extended Migration
Profile of the Republic of Moldova 42 http://date.gov.md/ckan/ro/organization/1138-ministerul-afacerilor-interne?page=3
20
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR43) represents an important data source
on the protection of: (i) refugees and applicants for asylum, (ii) stateless persons and (iii) returned and
internally displaced persons.
2.2. Statelessness Evolution in the Republic of Moldova
The availability of data on statelessness differs from one institution to another, also the number of people
registered under this status is different.
The National Bureau of Statistics provides only data on persons without a citizenship registered during
population censuses. So, in the one performed in 2004, there were 5374 persons registered without citizenship.
According to the PHC data of 12–25 May 2014, conducted by NBS, the number of persons without citizenship
for this period was of 433. The majority of them, more than 70%, were eof an employable age (aged 18-64),
and one out of five was a child. In the urban area were registered 48%, respectively in the rural one – 52%.
Male constituted 56% among persons without a citizenship, female – 44%.
Table 1. Data on Population according to PHC, 2014, number of persons44
Total Age group, years
0-17 18-64 65+
Total
Total population 2.804.801 585.449 1.913.888 305.464
Citizens of other states 14.744 2.771 10.402 1.571
Without citizenship 433 84 309 40
Urban
Total population 950.994 182.543 669.116 99.335
Citizens of other states 8.188 1.246 5.849 1.093
Without citizenship 207 46 139 22
Rural
Total population 1.853.807 402.906 1.244.772 206.129
Citizens of other states 6.556 1.525 4.553 478
Without citizenship 226 38 170 18
Male
Total population 1.352.099 300.616 937.619 113.864
Citizens of other states 7.199 1.426 5.187 586
Without citizenship 244 43 181 20
Female
Total population 1.452.702 284.833 976.269 191.600
Citizens of other states 7.545 1.345 5.215 985
Without citizenship 189 41 128 20
Source: NBS, PHC
The Public Services Agency has data on stateless persons since 2000, when their number constituted 200
of persons, with a different evolution from year to year. In 2016, the total number of stateless persons reported
by the PSA reached 1972 persons, with a bigger rate of female 58% compared to male. The highest rate of
43http://popstats.unhcr.org/en/overview 44http://www.statistica.md/public/files/Recensamint/Recensamint_pop_2014/Rezultate/Tabele/Caracteristici_populatie_Comune_
RPL_2014_rom_rus_eng.xls
21
36% represents the age group between 30-39 years, and the lowest one of only 5% - those aged between 20-
29.
Table 2. Number and Distribution of stateless persons by gender and age by the end of 2000 - 2016
31.12.2000 31.12.2005 31.12.10 31.12.12 31.12.13 31.12.14 31.12.15 31.12.16
Total 200 1556 2031 1998 2024 2034 2022 1972
inclusively:
Male 121 583 837 817 833 836 833 821
Female 79 973 1194 1181 1191 1198 1189 1151
of which
Aged under 19 - total 2 73 15 6 2 3 3 0
Male 1 32 7 3 2 3 3 -
Female 1 41 8 3 - - - -
Aged between 20-29- total 44 607 571 478 440 298 186 104
Male 21 195 255 222 210 145 92 52
Female 23 412 316 256 230 153 94 52
Aged between 30-39- total 62 330 547 565 562 660 704 710
Male 44 129 180 180 171 224 259 280
Female 18 201 367 385 391 436 445 430
Aged between 40-49- total 45 260 396 386 405 411 433 440
Male 28 113 183 178 186 180 179 174
Female 17 147 213 208 219 231 254 266
Aged between 50-59- total 18 159 301 322 346 354 362 372
Male 10 65 126 137 156 157 163 172
Female 8 94 175 185 190 197 199 200
Aged over 60 - total 29 127 201 241 269 308 334 346
Male 17 49 86 97 108 127 137 143
Female 12 75 115 144 161 181 197 203
Source: PSA
UNHCR holds data starting year 2006, without any disaggregations.
Table 3. Number of stateless persons, persons, 2006-201545
2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Stateless
persons
1706 1663 1807 2014 2031 2073 1998 2029 2036 5017
Source: UNHCR, Population statistics
45http://popstats.unhcr.org/en/persons_of_concern/aEXuVR
22
If we compare the available data, it can be noticed that they are comparable tot those from PSA for the
period of 2010-2014, with a signifcant discrepancy observed for year 2015, for which the PSA presents by the
end of the year 2022 persons, while UNHCR – 5017 persons withrespective status.
Beginning with 2012, in the Republic of Moldova is applied the procedure for recognition of the
statelessness status, the bureau for Migration and Asylum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs being the
responsible authority for the examination of applications for recognition of the statelessness status. Thus,
according to the data provided by the BMA of the MIA, during 2012-2016 there were 728 persons, who
solicited the recognition of the statelessness status, 283 of them being recognized as stateless and 216 were
rejected the recognition of the respective status.
Table 4. Data on stateless persons, persons 2012-2016
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 Total
2012-2016
Applications for the
recognition of the statelessness
status submitted
104 280 132 101 111 728
Decisions of recognition of
the statelessness status
issued
6 95 89 66 27 283
Decisions on the rejection of
request for the recognition of
the statelessness status issued
9 68 87 32 20 216
Source: BMA of MIA
For the establishment of the number of stateless persons and of persons who are at risk of becoming
stateless, who are serving their sentence in penitentiary institutions of the Republic of Moldova, the
Department of Penitentiary Institutions of the Ministry of Justice was contacted. Therefore, according to the
data provided by the Department of Penitentiary Institutions it was found out that during the time the study in
question was carried out, there were 285 persons in detention, of which:
- Persons who don’t hold any identification documents and whose belonging to the nationality of any state
cannot be determined – 100 detainees;
- Persons that hold a Soviet-type passport – 2 detainees;
- Persons documented with temporary identity cards (F-9), without the specification of belonging to the
citizenship of the Republic of Moldova– 178 detainees;
- Persons with a statelessness status – 5 detainees.
2.3 Current situation and the profile of a stateless person in the Republic of Moldova
23
The Republic of Moldova cooperates with other states and international organizations in solving the issues
related to statelessness. As a result of the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the UN instruments
regarding statelessness, the Government priorities in this field remain assistance in the establishment of a
functional procedure for determining statelessnes and for the improvement of national legislation, as well as
offering support in the identification of unregistered stateless persons. UNHCR provides the same assistance
through information campaings and participative evaluation in different regions of the country, inclusive of
the RM and the Transnistrean region.
Provided that they don’t have any legal status on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, the applicants
face a lot of problems, such as ownership of a property, access to labour market, education, healthcare services
and social protection, marriage or newborns registry, opeing of a bank account, etc.
The uncertain situation of these people can also present a source of problems for the state thay are in. If
they cannot earn their living because they cannot find a job, they will seek for less legal ways to get financial
support, thus entering in conflict with law and the public order.
By the end of 2016, there were approximately two thousand people living in the country with valid
documents for stateless persons, more than two thousand people with undetermined citizenship and more than
ten thousand people with Soviet-type passports (Table 5).
Table 5. Number of stateless persons, people with undetermined citizenship and with Soviet-type passports registered on the
teriitory of the RM by the end of the years 2015-2016
2015 2016
Stateless persons with valid documents (CC) 2022 1972
Stateless persons with expired documents (CC) 664 667
Persons with a Soviet-type passport 10486 9545
Persons with undetermined citizenship 2322 2118
Source: PSA
Out of the total number of documented stateless persons with valid identification documents (1972
persons) the majority were from the former USSR. The structure by gender, reveals that women prevail in the
total number of stateless persons with approximately 40%. The data analysis regarding the distribution of
documented stateless persons by age groups shows that the most numerous are aged between 30-49 (58%),
followed by those aged 50 and above (36%), these two age groups constitute together 94% of the total number
of documented stateless persons with valid identification documents registered into the National Passport
System. It is found out that there are no minor children among the documentedd stateless persons.
Table 6. Distribution of stateless persons by gender and large age groups by the end of the years 2012-2016, persons
31.12.12 31.12.13 31.12.14 31.12.15 31.12.16
Total 1998 2024 2034 2022 1972
24
inclusively:
Male 817 833 836 833 821
Female 1181 1191 1198 1189 1151
Aged 0-29 484 442 301 189 104
Aged 30-49 1042 967 1071 1137 1150
Aged 50 and over 563 615 662 696 718
Source: PSA
As mentioned since 2012 in the Republic of Moldova is applied the procedure of recognition of the
statelesness status. The responsible authority for the examination of applications for recognition of the
statelessness status is the Bureau for Migration and Asylum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Submitted applications. During 2012 – 2016 there were 728 applications for the recognition of the
stateless status submitted to the BMA. The dynamic of applications in this period has registered different
values between approximately 100 and 300 per year (Figure Nr.1).
Figure 1. Annual number of applications submitted during 2012-2016, for the recognition of the statelessness status
Source: BMA
The statistical data on the distribution of persons who submitted an application for hte recognition of the
statelessness status in 2016 by country of birth, reveals the fact that the majority ome from the former USSR
republics, on the first places being those born in the Russian Federation and Ukraine, that sum up to
approximately 70%, followed by Kazakhstan (5,4%), Georgia and Uzbekistan (câte 4,3%).
The data analysis regarding the age group of people that submitted an application in 2016 indicates that
the pre-pensioneer age group aged 50-59 has the highest rate (27%), followed by those aged 60-69 with 24%.
To be mentioned that those aged under 29, form a pretty high rate of 14,2% from the total number (Figure 2).
Figure 2. Structure of the number of people that submitted an application for the recognition of the statelessness
status by age groups in 2016
104
280
132101 111
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
25
Source: BMA
under 29
aged 70 and over
not indicated
The structure of the number of persons who submitted an application for the status recognition by civil
status in 2016, was respresented in proportion of 35% by married people, being followed by unmarried - 24%
and divorced ones -15% (other situations and undeclared civil status sum up to other approximately 26%).
During the period from 2012 to 2016 BMA issued 613 decisions on the basis of submitted applications
(728). The aanual distribution of issued decisions by types is presented in the table below:
Table 7. Number of annual decisions issued by types during 2012-2016
Type of decision 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 Total
2012-2016
Total decisions 17 195 210 123 68 613
Inclusive of :
Recognition of the statelessness status 6 95 89 66 27 283
Rejection of the application for the
recognition of the statelessness status
9 68 87 32 20 216
Cancellation of the statelessness status - - 1 - - 1
Termination of the procedure for the
recognition of the statelessness status
2 32 33 25 21 113
Source: BMA
The data analysis on the number of issued decisions by their type denotes that less than a half (46%) of the
persons who submitted an application for the recognition of the statelessness status during 2012-2016 received
the requested status. For 2016 this rate is even lower and constitutes approximately 40% (Figure 3). The low
rate of the respective indicator is a result of the legal framework modification that provides for the possibility
of soliciting the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova on the basis of the solicitant’s confirmation certificate
of the statelessness status issued by the BMA of the MIA46. The applicants for the statelessness status that hae
46Regulations on the Procedure on Acquisition and Loss of Citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, approved by the Government
Decision No. 197 as of 12.03.2001, Point.2, Letter a), http://lex.justice.md/md/295935/
14.2
5.5
20.6
27.324
7.7
0.70
5
10
15
20
25
30
până la 29 30-39 40-49 50-59 60-69 70 ani și peste
Neindicat
%
26
a reason for being recognized as citizens of the Republic of Moldova are directed for submittion of documents
for citizenship, avoiding in this way the recognition of these persons as stateless.
During the reported period there were rejected 35% of the total number of submitted applications, and
for 18% of the total number the procedure of recognition of the statelessness status has been stopped for
different reasons – holding the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova or of any other state, application
withdrawal as a result of acquiring the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova or of any other state, no presence
at the interview or death.
Figure 3. Co-report on decisions issued by type during 2012-2016, %
Source: BMA
Recognition of the statelessness status
Rejection of the application for the recognition of the statelessness status
End of procedure the recognition of the statelessness status
Recognition of the statelessness status. The distribution by country of birth of the persons in regards of
whom decisions on the applications for the recognition of the statelessness status during 2012-2016 were,
place on the first rank the Russian Federation Federația Rusă (43%), on the second one – Ukraine (24%), on
the third one – Kazakhstan (11%), followed by Uzbekistan and Armenia (~ 4%), other states constituting 3%
and less for each (Table 8).
Table 8. Structure of the number of persons in relation to whom a decision on recognition of the statelessness status
was issued, by country of birth during 2012-2016, percent
Country of birth Total 2012-2016
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
100%
2012-2016
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 Total
35.348.7 42.4 53.7
39.7 46.2
52.9 34.9 41.4 26.029.4
35.2
11.8 16.4 15.7 20.3 30.918.4
Încetarea procedurii de recunoaștere a statutului de apatrid
Respingerea cererii de recunoaștere a statutului de apatrid
Recunoașterea statutului de apatrid
27
Total 100
Russian Federation 43,3
Ukraine 24,4
Kazakhstan 10,5
Uzbekistan 3,8
Armenia 3,6
Georgia 3,1
Azerbaidjan 2,4
Tajikistan 2,4
Belarus Republic 1,3
Turkmenistan 1,0
Other 4,2 Source: BMA
The data analysis on age groups of the persons recognized as stateless during 2012- 2016 indicates the
diversity of ages (for ex. min. 20 years old and max.-94), among the age groups with a higher ratio there are
groups aged 40-49 and 50-59 (summing up to 44,3%), followed by the groups of aged under 29 and aged 30-
39 (summing up to ~ 28%), cumulating 72,4% from the total number of persons (Figure 4). The distribution
of young persons (under 29 years old) by the country of birth reveals that most of them come from Ukraine,
the Russian Federation, Kazakhstan and Armenia.
Figure 4. Structure of the number of persons with a statelessness status by age groups during 2012 - 2016
Source: BMA
under 29
aged 80 and above
At the same time the analysis of data regarding the age and gender of stateless persons, denotes that 29%
from the total number are above the employment age (pension age), of them women constituting 61% and
men – 39% respectively.
The structure of the number of stateless persons by civil status in the analyzed period was made up of
36% of single persons, followed by -33% of married and 14% of divorced ones (other situations and
undeclared ones sum up to 17%).
Out of the total number of stateless persons, that indicated their domicile in the Republic of Moldova, it
can be noticed that the majority domiciles in the urban area (60%). Their distribution by districts of domicile
13.6 14
22.4 21.718.2
5.93.5
0
5
10
15
20
25
până la 29 30-39 40-49 50-59 60-69 70 -79 80 ani și peste
%
28
shows that approximately 27% live in the Transnistrian region, 18,2% - in the Chisinau municipality, 3,1% -
in Criuleni and Straseni districts each, 2,8% - in Anenii Noi district and 2,4%- in Causeni.
2.4. Situation assessment regarding undocumented people at the local level
For a deeper research of the situation at the local level, as well as for the identification of issues faced
by both – population and LPA a selective study in three districts of the country was performed.
Scope of the study. Situation evaluation on statelessness at local level and quantitative analysis of the
information on undocumented persons on the basis of: (i) LPA Interview Guide, decision factors (Annex 1)
and (ii) Interview Guide of Natural Persons (Annex 2).
The mentioned study was conducted in rural areas of three districts, one from the south, one from the
Central and one from the Northern regions, respectively Cahul, Orhei and Edinet, and included three semi-
structured interviews with representatives of LPAs, of other decision factors at local levels, as well as
questionnairing of a number of people from district areas, concerned by the study.
Findings of the study. In total there was requested information from 107 mayoralties (approximately
317 thousand inhabitants), being received 103 filled-in questionnaires, that consitutes 96,26% from the total
number. In the total population of the surveyed areas, that presented the requested information, (nearly 260
thousand people) there were identified 255 undocumented persons, what constitutes 0,10%. Among them there
are 35 children, 194 adults and 25 pensioners.
Table 9. Data on population and undocumented persons in rural areas by districts
District Number of
population
Undocumented
persons, total
Children
under 16 Adults Pensioners
Orhei 126 257 101 11 80 10
Edinet* 52 681 44 3 38 2
Cahul** 80 422 110 21 76 13
Total 259 360 255 35 194 25
* The nr. of population from the Edinet municipality and Cupcini town is not included, as they haven’t presented information on
undocumented persons, by the moment of research conduction
** The nr. of population from the Cahul municipality, Bucuria, Gavanoasa and Tartaul de Salcie communes is not included, as they
haven’t presented the solicited information, by the moment of research conduction
The biggest number of undocumented people was registered in the Cahul district, both in absoulte
figures - 110 persons, an in share - 0,14% from the total number of the population of respondent areas. Also
in the Cahul District there was registered the biggest number of undocumneted children - 21, constituting
nearly 1/5 of the total undocumentel persons from this district.
The smallest number of undocumented people in amount of 44 persons are registered in rural areas from
the Edinet district with 3 undocumented children and 2 pensioners.
29
Figure 5. Distribution of undocumented persons by status
Pensioners
Adults
Children under 16 years old
Proportion of undocumented persons from the total population
Generally, there were identified undocumented persons in approximately 66% of localities included in
the study, and their number varies also on areas within districts. Out of the 33 rural localities from Cahul
district, in 9 there were no undocumented people, in 3 there were 10 persons in each an in one – 11
undocumented persons among which 6 children.
In Orhei district out of 38 localities, in 11 there were no undocumented people, in 25 the number varies
between 1 and 7 persons and in one (village Samananca) there were reported 15 undocumented persons, all of
them adults (no children or pensioners).
Respectively, in the Edinet district out of 30 localities taking part in the study, there were 14 in which no
undocumented people were registered, 15 with a varying number from 1 to 5 persons and one with the biggest
number of 8 persons recorded in Terebna village.
Persons of different ethnicities were mentioned as being undocumented, so in Cahul district there were
identified Moldovans, Russians, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Spaniards, in Orhei – Moldovans, Russians,
Ukrainians, Romanian Roma, Tajiks, in Edinet – Moldovans, Russians, Ukraininans. The ethnic distribution
of undocumented persons in localitites taking part at the study is the following: 68% are Moldovans, 12,5%
Ukraininans, 4,7% Roma, 4% Russians, others cumulate 1% each or less.
Nearly 75% of the undocumented persons have some documents, such as birth, marriage certificates,
temporary documents, etc. Among them the biggest number constitute the holders of Soviet-type passports,
who don’t want or cannot document themselves, motivating by poor vulnerable and financial situation, namely
lack of necessary financial ressources for paying the respective service.
30
Also, there are people that qualify for the stateless status, one of them being directed to the BMA for
determining the status, a significant number (32 persons) – for the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova,
but don’t have identity or birth documents, thus being at risk of becoming stateless. To be mentioned, that
there was recorded a number of cases of children registration after the monitoring isits.
As a result we can conclude that the main reasons of undocumentation have a social economic nature, as
well as indifference, parents’ irresponsibility, poor financial situation, religious reasons. As examples can be
mentioned the following explanations presented by respondents:
- The child cannot be documented because the mother has lost the national passport;
- The child cannot be documented because mother’s passport is expired or is unvalid because she has
changed her family name after marriage;
- Was not documented for religious reasons;
- Hold Soviet-type birth certificates and passports, are not interested in documenting with identity cards
of the Republic of Moldova, because of poor social situation;
- Are born in the Republic of Moldova, but have no documents, don’t want to apply for ID cards for
vulnerability reasons;
- Are born in other states (Ukraine), came in the Republic of Moldova with Soviet-type passports which
have expired;
- Children were not registered because parents cohabit and haven’t registered their marriage.
CASE
STUDY
Brothers
A.U. and
A.F.
Country
of origin: Russian Federation
A.U. aged 27 and A.F. aged 25 are brothers. They came to the Republic of Moldova at the age of 11 and
9 years respectively. Their parents got divorced and their mother, who is from the Republic of Moldova
brought them to her parents. Later mother left them by their grandparents to tae care of them and went to the
Russian Federation. Brothers A.U. and A.F. lost connection with their mother and don’t kow where she is.
Up[on reaching full age, A.U. and A.F. addressed themselves to authorities for receiving ID cards, but,
because they were not recorded as citizens in the State Register of population, they were refused the issuance
Examples: A young woman born in the Russian Federation. Mother – citizen of the Ukraine, deceased.
Father is citizen of the RM. Because parents were not staying legally in the Russian Federation, Russian
civil status authorities refused the birth registry. As a result, the father brought his daughter to the
Republic of Moldova without any identification documents. The young woman has only a photocopy of
her medical certificate of birth and her mother’s death certificate..
A young woman, aged 16, born in the Republic of Moldova, both parents citizens of RM (socially
ulnerable family). Parents didn’t ask for issuance of a birth certificate.
Woman, aged 69, born in the Russian Federation, came to the Republic of Moldova with a Soviet-type
passport, which she had lost. Has all the civil status documents, but no identity documents
Woman, born 1994 (vulnerable person), has a birth certificate, but who has no relatives of 1-3 degree,
who could confirm her identity for obtaining an identity card.
31
of identity documents. Despit the fact, that one of the parents of A.U. and A.F. originates from the Republic
of Moldova, as well as the grandparents from mother’s side are also citiens of the Republic of Moldova, and,
according to the legislation would hae had the right to be recognized as citizens of the Republic of Moldova,
brothers encountered difficulties in identifying their belonging to the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova,
because thay were not able to prove the kinship with their mother. As eidence they only had their mother’s
birth certificate with her maiden name. As a result of marriage with the brothers’ father, she had taken the
spouse’s family name, which appears in the birth certificats of A.U. and A.F. After divorce mother returned
to her maiden name and for proving the kinship between mother and children it was necessary to present the
divorce certificate of the parents (mother’s copy):
"We tried to talk to our mother to pass her divorce certificate from our father to us, but achieved no result.
She didn’t want to go into contact. The authorities of the Republic of Moldova requested us to present the
divorce certificate of the parents, that would help to identify the kinship between us and our mother – as a
result, we would have been granted the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, which we are entitled to. We
tried to restore the parents’ diorce certificate by contacting the Civil Status Office ion the locality, but we
were told that we don’t have the right to do this, only parents can request a duplicate of the divorce certificate.
So we got trapped into a situation without valid identification documents, without any legal status on the
territory of the Republic of Moldova.”
A.U. and A.F. applied for the recognition of the statelessness status. As a result of the examination of their
case, it was decided to recognize the statelessness status of brothers A.U. and A.F.
According to the opinion of the decision factors of local ;eel, issues which are faced by undocumented
persons are basically of social, economic and political origin, such as:
- limited access to public services, inclusive of social and medical assistance;
- problems at employment, the majority doesn’t work or work on a daily/occasional basis;
- imposibility of obtaining a diploma in the case of minors;
- absence of political rights.
Situation of undocumented children. Though international and national legal norms guarantee that
every child has by birth the right to a name and to oacquirebtain a citizenship, after the situation evaluation
regarding undcumented persons at the local level, out of 255 persons identified as undocumented, 35 are
children (14 %).
Thus, Article 7 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child guarantees the child’s right to be
registered and to acquire a citizenship. " The child shall be registered immediately after birth and shall have
the right from birth to a name, the right to acquire a nationality and. as far as possible, the right to know and
be cared for by his or her parents". These provisions are also to be found in Art. 5, paragraph (1) of the Law
on the Rights of the Children No. 338-XIII as of 15 December 1994, that stipulates that "from the moment of
birth the child has the right to a name and is registered according to the provisions of the Family Code".
32
In order to respect the child’s right to be registered at birth Art. 22 paragraphs (1), (2) of the Law No.
100-XV as of 26 April 2001 on Civil Status Acts provides for the obligtion of parents to declare the birth of
the child by both parents or by one of them, and if the parents don’t have the possibility to personally declare
the birth of the child, the respective declaration is made by the relatives of the parents or other person
empowered by them, by the administration of the sanitary unit where the child was born, by the guardianship
authority, as well as by other persons.
By the declaration of the child’s birth, a medical certificate confirming the birth is presented, as well as
the identification documents of the aprents (of one of them), and the documents and acts on the basis of which
the data of child’s father will be recorded into the birth certificate. If the declarant is not one of the parents,
his/her identification document is provided too47.
Though, analyzing the legal framework it seems to guarantee the child’s right to birth registration, from
the analysis of the data provided in the study it was relevant tha fact that in the majority of cases children’s
birth wasn’t registered because mother had no valid identification documents.
Without a citizenship and a legally certified identity, these children can be restricted from the rights to
social protection, healthcare, education, etc. Thus, none of the interviewees felt that their children’s rights to
education had been violated because of their legal status: children of school age are accepted in local schools
without restrictions.
CASE STUDY
Z.N., female, 34 years old
Country of origin: Russian Federation
Z.N. is 34 years old, she is of Roma origin, coming from the Russian Federation, doesn’t have any
identification or civil status documents. Z.N. came to the Republic of Moldova at the age of 16. She had been
illegally transported by a person of Roma origin, on the basis of a birth certificate issued for another name.
In the Republic of Moldova she cohabits with a citizen of the Republic of Moldova. She is mother of 7
children, citizens of the Republic of Moldova, who, at the time of addressing to the Bureau for Migration and
Asylum were not documented with civil status acts, because their mother didn’t have valid identification
documents:
"Bacause I don’t hae any valid ID document, I cannot do birth certificates for my children, who were
born in the Republic of Moldova, and are citizens of this state. Children’s father has repeatedly approached
authorities for issuance of civil status documents, but every time he was told, that without the mother of the
children such documents cannot be issued. For this reason, my children were not able to receive social
47 Art.22 Paragraph (3) of Law No. 100–XV as of 26 April 2001 on Civil Status Acts,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=312727
33
assistance and allowances citizen children are entitled to. Every time I approached the authorities, I got
refused because I don’t hold a valid identification document. So, according to legislation, my children are
citizens of the Republic of Moldova and have the rights of a citizen,but, in fact, because their mother doesn’t
have identification documents, they don’t have access to the rights they are entitled to."
Z.N. has submitted the application for recognition of the statelessness status, which was accepted.
Despite the fact that Z.N. didn’t hold any civil status acts or identification documents issued in the country of
origin, the Bureau for Migration and Asylum issued an ID card for stateless persons to Z.N. based on the
decision for the recognition of the statelessness status. At the moment, the problem of documenting the
children of Z.N. with civil status acts was solved.
34
III. DETERMINATION OF STATELESSNESS AND RIGHTS RELATING TO THE STATUS
OF STATELESS PERSONS
3.1 National legal framework
The legal framework of the Republic of Moldova is being elaborated on a constitutional basis which
states by the way that the human rights and freedoms are guaranteed supreme values. Article 4 of the
Constitution of the Republic of Moldova provides that human rights and freedoms shall be interpreted and are
enforced in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with the conventions and other
treaties to which the Republic of Moldova is a party. It also sustains the priority of international law (of human
rights) towards the domestic legal system. At the same time, the article 8 of the Constitution states that the
Republic of Moldova undertakes to observe the Charter of the United Nations and the treaties to which it is
party, to ground its relationships with other states on the unanimously recognized principles and norms of
international law48.
In addition to the general provisions, article 17 (2) of the Basic Law states that no one may be arbitrarily
deprived of his/her citizenship, whereas Article 19 (1) supports the equality of rights and duties for citizens,
foreign citizens and stateless persons, with the exceptions provided for by law49.
The Republic of Moldova has acceded to the Convention on the reduction of the statelessness on
December 8, 2011 without any reservations in this respect50 and on December 27, 2011, acceded to the
Convention relating to the status of stateless persons in 1954 with two reservations51. In particular, reservations
concern the applicability of the provisions of articles 23 (public assistance), 24 (legislation regarding labor
and social security), 25 (administrative assistance) and 31 (expelling) from the Convention of 1954, and
namely, the Republic of Moldova reserves the right to apply the provisions of the above articles in accordance
with national law.
At the same time, Article 27 of the Convention (issuance of identity documents) applies only to stateless
persons whose status has been recognized by the Republic of Moldova, as well as those with the right of
residence on the territory of the Republic of Moldova. Therefore, the provisions of this article apply to persons
who have passed the legal procedure for determining the statelessness status on the territory of the Republic
of Moldova and who have been recognized as stateless persons, as well as stateless persons who have legally
entered the territory of the Republic of Moldova and have obtained the right of residence in accordance with
the legislation in force.
48 Eugen Osmochescu, “Legislation of the Republic of Moldova from perspectives of the Conventions of the United Nations’
Conventions regarding the statelessness”, 2010, par. 11. 49 Ibid., par. 12. 50 http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=341953 51 http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=342052
35
Upon accession Conventions regarding statelessness of 1954 and 1961, the Government of the Republic
of Moldova has undertaken to take measures to implement the provisions of those Conventions52. Thus, in the
context of accession to the two Conventions on statelessness, amendments have been made to Law No. 275
of 10 November 1994 on the legal status of foreign citizens and stateless persons in the Republic of Moldova
(currently repealed), Law No. 1024 of 2 June 2000 on the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, Law No.
200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova.
Prior to accession to the two Conventions on statelessness, the notion of “stateless” was present in
national legislation in various forms:
Stateless person – a person who is not a citizen of the Republic of Moldova or a citizen of another state
and
Stateless person – a person who is not a citizen of the Republic of Moldova and has no proof of
connection to another state.
Following the modification of the normative framework the notion of “stateless person” was uniformed
and transposed in accordance with the provisions of the Convention of 1954. Currently, the definition of
“stateless person” is found in Law No. 1024 of June 2, 2000 on the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova53
and Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova54, and is exposed in
the following form:
Stateless person - a person who is not considered as a citizen by any state, under the operation of its law.
The Convention of 1954 sets out the rights and obligations of the persons to whom it applies, but does
not say anything about the mechanisms for identifying and determining of the persons to whom it applies.
However, the UNHCR Handbook on the protection of stateless persons, states that “in the 1954 Convention
implies that States must identify stateless persons in their jurisdictions so as to provide them appropriate
treatment in order to comply with their Convention commitments”.55
The Republic of Moldova has established a national mechanism for determining the status of stateless
people, approved by Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova,
which is in force since 10 February 2012.56
3.2 Procedure on recognition of the status of stateless persons
52 See Art. 2 of Law No. 252 of 08.12.2011 for the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the Convention relating to the
reduction of statelessness and art. 4 of the Law No. 275 of 27.12.2011 for the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the
Convention relating to the status of Statelessness persons. 53 See art. 1 of Law No. 1024 of June 2, 2000 on citizenship of the Republic of Moldova 54 See art. 3 of Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova 55 UNHCR Handbook relating to the protection of statelessness persons, par. 8 56 See Law No. 284 of 28.12.2011 for amending and supplementing certain legislative acts
36
Simultaneously with the accession to the UN Conventions on statelessness, the Moldovan authorities
developed and implemented the national procedure on recognition of the status of stateless persons. The
procedure is approved by Law No. 200 of 16.07. 2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova
and shall apply from February 10, 2012.
3.2.1 Identification of stateless persons
The concept of “stateless person” under the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons
is defined as a person who is not considered as a citizen by any state, under the operation of its law.
In the national legislation, the term “stateless person” can be found in several laws: Law No.1024 of
02.06.2000 on the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova (Article 1) and Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the
regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova (Article 3) which define the term “stateless person” in the
same way as the definition of “stateless person” in the 1954 Convention:
Stateless person - a person who is not considered as a citizen by any state, under the operation of its law.
3.2.2 Competent authority
The authority responsible for determining status of stateless persons is the Bureau for Migration and
Asylum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs - a competent authority for foreigners. This competence derives
from the provisions of Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova
stipulating that the procedure for the recognition of the status of stateless persons may be initiated by the
competent authority for foreigners and the application for the recognition of the status of stateless person shall
be submitted in writing or verbally to the competent authority for foreigners.57
A more detailed description of the competences of the Bureau for Migration and Asylum of the Ministry
of Internal Affairs in the field of statelessness is stipulated in the Regulation regarding the organization and
functioning of the Bureau for Migration and Asylum subordinated to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, approved
by the Government Decision No. 914 of 07.11.2014.58
According to the above mentioned Regulation, the Bureau for Migration and Asylum is an
administrative authority subordinated to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, created in order to ensure the
implementation of the policy on migration, asylum, statelessness and the integration of foreigners.59
The mission of the Bureau is to achieve the prerogatives regarding the implementation of policy in the
field of migration and asylum, managing the migration phenomenon by admitting and documenting foreigners
with identity papers, recognizing the status of refugee and stateless person, granting humanitarian protection,
coordinating the process the integration of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova, the control of legality of
57 See art. 871 par. (1), (2) of Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova. 58 http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=355409 59 See p. 2 of Regulation regarding the organization and functioning of the Bureau for Migration and Asylum under the Ministry
of Internal Affairs, approved by Government Decision No. 914 of 07.11.2014.
37
stay of foreigners on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, the public custody and the proper application
of the removal measures and restrictive measures.60
In order to accomplish its mission, the Bureau for Migration and Asylum participates in the elaboration
of state policy by formulating proposals in the field of migration, asylum, statelessness, integration of
foreigners, implements and supervises the observance of legislation in the field of migration, asylum,
integration and statelessness, other legislative and normative acts related to these problems.61
At the same time, in the field of statelessness, the Bureau for Migration and Asylum has the following
main tasks:
- participates in the monitoring of implementation of the actions provided in the statelessness policy
documents;
- implements and executes, within its competencies, the provisions of the international acts in the field
of statelessness;
- represents the Ministry of Internal Affairs in relations with the international organizations with
responsibilities in the field of migration and asylum, initiates and carries out joint projects and programs in
the field of migration, asylum, foreigners’ integration and statelessness;
- examines applications for granting / extending the right of residence to recognized stateless persons
outside the Republic of Moldova;
- recognizes, refuses and cancels the status of stateless person;
- issues identity and travel documents for stateless persons;
- verify the legality of the stay and employment of foreign citizens and stateless persons on the territory
of the Republic of Moldova, as well as apply, if necessary, sanctions of contravention in respect thereof;
- issues, in respect of foreign citizens and stateless persons, decisions to return, to return under escort,
to revoke and cancel the right of residence, to annul the visa, to declare the foreigner as an undesirable person,
and applies / annuls entrance and exit prohibitions in / from the Republic of Moldova;
- proceeds in the courts for the public custody of foreign citizens and stateless persons who cannot be
removed within 24 hours, as well as the prolongation thereof;
- enforces the judgments of the courts regarding expulsion of foreign citizens and stateless persons from
the territory of the Republic of Moldova;
- removes foreign citizens and stateless persons from the territory of the Republic of Moldova;
- applies the regime of tolerance in the Republic of Moldova regarding foreign citizens and stateless
persons;
60 Ibid. p. 6. 61 Ibid. p. 7 (1, 2).
38
- performs the recording of foreign citizens and stateless persons who carry out their criminal
punishment on the territory of the Republic of Moldova.62
Within the Bureau for Migration and Asylum, the attributions for the examination of applications for
recognition of status of stateless person are assumed by the Department of statelessness and information within
the Directorate of asylum and integration which is responsible for the implementation policies in the field of
asylum by examining and resolving applications for asylum by protecting asylum seekers, beneficiaries of
international protection, temporary protection or political asylum.63
3.2.3 Procedural aspects
3.2.3.1 Access to the procedure
The UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons provides as follows: for procedures to be
fair and efficient, access to them must be ensured. Everyone in a State’s territory must have access to the
statelessness determination procedures. There is no basis in the convention for requiring that applicants for
statelessness determination be lawfully within a State. Such a requirement is particularly inequitable, given
that lack of nationality denies many stateless persons the very documentation that is necessary to enter or
reside in any state lawfully.64
Also, there is no basis in the Convention for setting deadlines for requesting the status of stateless person.
These deadlines may arbitrarily exclude individuals from receiving the protection of the 1954 Convention.65
In the Republic of Moldova, the procedure for recognizing the status of stateless person is initiated ex
officio or at the request of a person claiming to have no citizenship. The application may be filed in writing
or verbally at the Bureau for Migration and Asylum, at the territorial subdivisions of Bureau in Balti, Cahul
and Comrat, at the Temporary Placement Center of foreigners.66
The application must contain a clear and detailed description of the facts, information and evidence
required, in particular the applicant’s place of birth, his/ her family relationships with other persons holding
the nationality of a state, his usual place of residence in any other state and its length.67
The national legislation does not require any special conditions for submitting an application for
recognition of the status of stateless person. Article 871 of Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of
foreigners in the Republic of Moldova stipulates that the procedure is initiated at the request of the person
claiming that he/she has no citizenship. Another condition is that the application must be signed by the
applicant personally, and if the applicant is illiterate, this fact must me mentioned in minutes at the submission
62 Ibid. p. 8 (1e, 2c, 2d, 4b, 5b, 5c, 7a, 7c, 7d, 7e, 7f, 7g, 7h, 7i). 63 See art. 4 of Law No. 270 of 18.12.2008 on asylum in the Republic of Moldova. 64 UNHCR handbook on protection of statelessness persons, par. 68-69. 65 Ibid., par. 70 66 See art. 871 par. (1), (2) of the Law No. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova 67 Ibid. art. 871 par. (5).
39
of the verbal application. We conclude that access to the procedure is guaranteed to any person on the territory
of the Republic of Moldova regardless his status or residence in the Republic of Moldova. The sole compulsory
condition is the physical presence of the person before the competent authorities of the Republic of Moldova.
However, the legal framework provides for cases when the authorities may refuse to accept applications
on recognition of status of stateless person. This rule applies to persons recognized by the Moldovan
authorities as having rights and obligations related to the fact that they have the citizenship of the Republic of
Moldova.68 In this case the provisions of the national legislation on citizenship apply and the persons are
directed to the authorities responsible for citizenship issues.
Therefore, we note that access to the procedure is not conditioned by requirement of legal residence of
the applicant on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, and does not impose any legal terms in which an
application for recognition of the status of stateless person can be submitted. At the same time, during the
examination procedure, the applicant shall not pay any fee for application examination and issuance of
temporary identity papers.
National legislation sets a legal deadline for examining applications for recognition of statelessness
status. Thus, the deadline for processing a request is up to 6 months from the date of its registration. Depending
on the difficulty of the case, the authorities may extend the settlement period by one month, but the extension
will not exceed a total of 6 months. Therefore, the maximum period for examining an application for
recognition of statelessness status may not exceed 12 months from the date of its registration.69
3.2.3.2 Procedural safeguards
The UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons says that procedures for determining
status of stateless persons should be formalized by law. Establishing procedures through legislation ensures
fairness, transparency and clarity. Procedural safeguards are fundamental elements of procedures for
determining status of stateless persons. The guarantee process that must be integrated into administrative
procedures, including procedures for determining refugee status, are necessary in this context. Therefore,
States are encouraged to include the following procedural guarantees:
- provide information on the eligibility criteria, the determination procedure and the rights associated
with the recognition of stateless status; to provide applicants with advice on procedures in a language they
understand;
- ensure the right to interview with a decision-maker;
- receive requests in writing and to assist in forwarding it if necessary;
- provide access to translation / interpretation services in terms of filing the application and interviewing;
- guaranteeing the right of each family member to submit the application individually;
68 Ibid. art. 871 par. (8). 69 Ibid. art. 872para. (1).
40
- provision should be made for the possibility of submitting a claim by a minor through the adult
representing him, and for unaccompanied minors special procedural guarantees are provided;
- a child has the right to be heard if he has the ability to shape and express a vision;
- ensure that applicants have access to legal assistance;
- determination of the status to be made on the basis of the individual merits of the claim with reference
to information in the country on legislation and practices in relevant states, including background information
and practice relevant to the case under consideration;
- if the determination is made in a judicial context, the process is to be rather investigative than
contradictory;
- drafting the written decisions with the presentation of the motivating party;
- issuing and communicating decisions within a reasonable time;
- ensuring the right of appeal; and
- ensuring access to UNHCR. 70
The analysis of the national procedure for the recognition of stateless status shows that the Republic of
Moldova broadly complied with the requirements of UNHCR and included in the national legislation the
guarantees mentioned above. During the proceedings the procedural guarantees enshrined in the national
legislation will be presented and a comparative analysis will be made.
3.2.3.3 The Interview
The right of the applicant for status of stateless person to interview is ensured by law. The competent
authority for foreigners is to conduct an interview with the applicant for stateless status within 15 working
days of filing the application.71
The legal framework provides for mandatory minimum requirements to be observed when conducting
an interview with stateless persons. Thus, any interview with applicants for stateless status is recorded in
writing in an interview note and is to include the following information:
a) identity data (current name and surname, and previously held name and surname, previous citizenship,
gender, place and date of birth, names of parents);
b) the fact of submitting any information necessary to solve the request;
c) data on the documents submitted (type, number of the document, date of validity, date and place of
issue, name of the issuing authority);
d) the marital status, the place where the marriage was concluded;
e) occupation and studies;
70UNHCR Handbook on theProtection of StatelessPersons, par. 71. 71See Art. 874 para. (1) of the Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on theregime of foreignersin the Republic of Moldova.
41
f) place of residence in the Republic of Moldova, etc.72
In the interview, the applicant must declare the reasons for the application and submit any available
evidence not previously submitted in support of his / her application for recognition of stateless status. About
this obligation, the applicant is informed at the beginning of the interview.73
The legal framework provides guarantees for certain special categories of people, such as minors,
unaccompanied minors and people with mental disorders, declared disabled or persons with limited exercise
capacity.
During the interview, unaccompanied minors are assisted by the representative of the institution in
which they are placed, designated by the administration of the institution, and in the case of minors
accompanied by one of the parents or a representative whose mandate derives from law or from a legal act. 74
Persons with mental disorders (mental illness or mental deficiencies) declared disabled or persons with
limited exercise capacity are accompanied during the interview by guardian or, as the case may be, by the
curator, under the law.75
Interview note is signed by the applicant, the official who conducted the interview, and in the presence
of an interpreter, and by the interpreter; in the case of an unaccompanied minor, the interview note is also
signed by his / her appointed representative, and in the case of a person with mental disorders declared
incapacitated or a person with limited exercise capacity - by his tutor or curator.76
3.2.3.4. The burden of proof
When examining the application, the Bureau for Migration and Asylum shall take the necessary steps to
collect information from the place of birth of the applicant, from his / her place of residence or from his / her
last domicile, also requests information to the state whose citizenship is held by family members and parents.
77
The applicant in his turn is obliged to cooperate fully with the Bureau for Migration and Asylum and to
submit evidence and any information in support of his / her application. 78
Public acts issued by the authorities of other States are accepted by the Bureau for Migration and Asylum
as evidence of probative force. In order to obtain the necessary documents in support of the request, the Bureau
for Migration and Asylum contacts the authorities of other states, diplomatic missions and consular offices of
the Republic of Moldova accredited abroad. 79
72Ibid., art. 874para. (2) 73Ibid., art. 874para. (3) 74Ibid., art. 874para. (4) 75Ibid., art. 874para. (5) 76Ibid., art. 874para. (6) 77Ibid., art. 872 para. (2) 78Ibid., art. 873 para. (2), letter. a) 79Ibid., art. 875 para. (2), (3)
42
If the person cannot provide any document for reasons beyond his or her control, the Bureau for
Migration and Asylum shall issue the decision on the recognition or rejection of the application for recognition
of statelessness on the basis of the documentary evidence that he has at his disposal. 80
Thus, we conclude that in the process of determining the status of stateless person, the burden of proof
is divided between the applicant and the responsible authority in the examination of the statelessness cases.
3.2.3.5 Decision on the application for recognition of the status of stateless person
The 1954 Convention expressly provides categories of persons to whom it does not apply. Therefore,
under Article 1.2 Convention shall not apply:
(i) to persons currently receiving protection or assistance from United Nations bodies or agencies other
than the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, for as long as they receive such protection or
assistance;
(ii) to persons who are recognized by the competent authorities of the country in which they reside as
having the rights and obligations relating to having the citizenship of that country;
(iii) persons in respect of whom there are serious grounds for believing that:
a) have committed an offense against peace, a war crime or a crime against humanity as defined in the
international instruments relating to these categories of offenses;
b) have committed a serious non-political offense outside their country of residence before being
admitted to that country;
c) have been accused of committing acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
In general, the exclusion clauses from the recognition of stateless status are contained in the legislation
of the Republic of Moldova. According to national law, the application for recognition of stateless status can
be refused if: a) the applicant receives protection or assistance from United Nations bodies or agencies - except
the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees - during the granting of protection or assistance; b) there
are good reasons to believe that the applicant has committed an offense against peace, a war crime or a crime
against humanity as provided for in the international treaties to which the Republic of Moldova is a party; c)
there are serious grounds for believing that the applicant has committed a serious non-political offense outside
the Republic of Moldova before being admitted to its territory; d) there are good reasons to believe that the
applicant has been charged with committing acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations;
e) the applicant holds the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova or the citizenship of another state; f) the
applicant is recognized by the Moldovan authorities as having rights and obligations related to having the
citizenship of the Republic of Moldova.81
80Ibid., art. 871 para. (6) 81Ibid., art. 878 para. (1)
43
The Bureau for Migration and Asylum issues the decision to recognize or reject the application for
recognition of statelessness based on all available information and evidence.82 Decisions shall be made in the
state language and communicated to the applicant by direct communication or by postal mail at his last
declared address.83
In the case of a decision rejecting an application for recognition of stateless person status, the applicant
shall be informed of the motivating part of the decision and the deadline for communication shall be 3 working
days from the date of the decision.84
Although the legislation does not provide a specific deadline for the communication of decisions on the
recognition of statelessness status, implicitly it is understood that the decision is to be communicated within
a shorter time.
CASE STUDY
A.E., female, 54 years
Country of origin: Kazakhstan
A.E. is 54 years old, is from Kazakhstan, holder of the Soviet-type passport issued by the authorities of
Kazakhstan. She has been living in Moldova since 1990. Before she came to the Republic of Moldova, she
resided in Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation. As evidence she presented the entries in the Soviet passport.
The reason why A.E. addressed a request for recognition of statelessness by legalizing the residence and
obtaining identity documents valid in the Republic of Moldova. A.E. does not bind anything with Kazakhstan,
because more than 20 years she lives in the Republic of Moldova. She did not address the authorities of the
Republic of Moldova beforehand to do the acts because she did not feel necessary in them. In the locality
where she lives, nobody asks for identity papers and everyone knows one another:
"I thought changing the Soviet passport to identity card would be a simple procedure. I thought that I have
been a citizen of the Republic of Moldova since I live here since August 1990. When I addressed the authorities
for the identity card, I was told that I do not have the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova and I am going
to address the Bureau for Migration and Asylum determining my legal status."
A.E. has submitted an application for recognition of stateless status, which has been accepted.
3.2.3.6 Suspension and termination of the status recognition procedure for stateless persons
As a stateless person could also be a refugee or have the right to a complementary form of protection,
states should ensure that confidentiality requirements for refugees who may be stateless are maintained in the
procedure for determining the status of stateless persons. Each applicant in the status determination procedure
is to be informed from the outset about the need to communicate the reasons for asylum, if any. The identity
82Ibid., art. 877 para. (1) 83Ibid., art. 877para. (2), (21), art. 878para (21) 84Ibid., art. 878para. (2)
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of a refugee or an asylum seeker must not be disclosed to the authorities of the country of origin of the
individual. Officials to determine statelessness may be required to address foreign authorities to applicants,
which could compromise the confidentiality of refugees and asylum seekers. In this case, the UNHCR
Handbook on the Protection of Stateless People suggests that refugee status should be established and that the
status quo be suspended. 85
At the same time, the Handbook states that under certain circumstances it should be possible for a person
to be able to reactivate the request for recognition of the statute of stateless person. An application for
recognition of stateless status may be re-activated if:
- is refused recognition of refugee status;
- refugee status has been recognized but subsequently ceased;
- refugee status was annulled because it did not meet the criteria for inclusion under Article 1A (2) of
the 1951 Convention; or
- if there is additional evidence that the person concerned is stateless.
Similar considerations apply to persons who simultaneously request recognition of statelessness status
and provide complementary protection. 86
In situations where a person is in the procedure of determining the status of stateless and calls for the
granting of international protection on the territory of the Republic of Moldova the legal framework expressly
provides for the priority of the asylum procedure with regard to the procedure for recognizing statelessness.
Article 8712 par. (1) of Law no. 200 from 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova
says the procedure for recognizing stateless status shall be suspended in case the applicant submits the
application for asylum under the conditions of Law no. 270-XVI of 18 December 2008 on asylum in the
Republic of Moldova, until the decision on the granting of a form of protection is issued.
The same article provides, that examination of the application for the recognition of stateless status will
be resumed if there is an irrevocable decision to reject the application for asylum or a provision on terminating
the examination of the asylum application issued under the Law on Asylum in the Republic of Moldova.
In this case, examination of the application for recognition of stateless status will be resumed from the
stage when it was interrupted. The term for suspending the procedure for recognizing statelessness is not
included within the timeframe for examining the application for the recognition of statelessness status.87
Thus, we find that in general the legislation transposes the recommendations of the UNHCR Manual on
the protection of stateless persons as regards the primacy of asylum procedures in relation to procedures for
the determination of statelessness. The legislation of the Republic of Moldova provides for the conditions
under which the procedure for recognizing statelessness can be terminated. Therefore, the recognition
85 UNHCR Manual on the Protection of Stateless Persons, par. 79. 86 Ibid., Par. 82 87 Ibid., Art. 8712, paragraph (2), (3)
45
procedure shall cease in the event of the death of the applicant, withdrawal of the application, not presenting
the applicant to the interview despite repeated written notifications and if the applicant has been granted
international protection on the territory of the Republic of Moldova.88
3.2.3.7 Termination and cancellation of stateless person status
Termination of the status of stateless person takes place under the conditions of the Law, automatically,
when the stateless person acquires the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova or the citizenship of another
state. In this respect, the stateless person is obliged to inform, within 30 days, the Bureau for Migration and
Asylum about the acquisition of citizenship of the Republic of Moldova or of another state.89
The legislation provides for the possibility of cancellation of stateless status recognized under Law no.
200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova if it is established that some acts or
evidence that were decisive for recognition are false and there are no grounds for maintaining the status of
stateless person, as well as if there are serious grounds for believing that the beneficiary satisfies the conditions
laid down for the rejection of the application for recognition of the status of stateless person.
In this case, the motivated decision on the cancellation of stateless person status shall be communicated
to the applicant within 3 working days from the date of issue, by direct communication or by postal mail at its
last declared address.90
3.2.3.8 Access to court
Article 20 par. (1) of the Constitution of the Republic of Moldova guarantees to any person the right to
effective satisfaction of the competent courts against acts that violate the rights, freedoms and legitimate
interests.
Law on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova expressly provides for the alien's right to
challenge the decisions of the Bureau for Migration and Asylum on the rejection of the application for
recognition of the status of a stateless person and the cancellation of Statelessness status through
administrative litigation.91
As a rule, the complaint is filed within 30 days of the date of the decision being communicated. The
procedure for examining the complaint is regulated by Law no. 793 of 10.02.2000 administrative litigation.92
Access to legal assistance, eligibility criteria and the way assistance is provided are set out in Law no.
198 of 26.07.2007 on State guaranteed legal aid.93 The law in question provides that foreign citizens and
88 Ibid., Art. 876 89 Ibid., Art. 8710 90 Ibid., Art. 879 91 Ibid., Art. 878 par. (2) and 879 para. (3) 92 http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=350170 93 http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=325350
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stateless persons benefit from state-guaranteed legal assistance in procedures or in cases falling within the
competence of the public administration authorities and the courts of the Republic of Moldova.94
Therefore, persons who need legal assistance in contravention cases, civil and administrative litigation,
but they do not have enough means to pay for these services, the causes being complex from a legal or
procedural point of view, have the right to qualified legal assistance. In this case, qualified legal aid is granted
to persons whose income is less than the level of income established by the Government for receiving legal
aid. The methodology for calculating income and the level of income that allows the provision of qualified
legal aid, as well as the form of the declaration of income, is approved by the Government. 95
Qualified legal aid is granted and if the person whose income is higher than the level of income
established by the Government to receive legal aid is able to pay some of the legal assistance expenses. In this
case, qualified legal aid is granted with the beneficiary's financial contribution if this contribution does not
exceed its financial and material possibilities.96
3.2.4 Procedure for establishing the identity of person
The normative framework of the Republic of Moldova provides for the procedure for determining the
identity of the person requesting the issuance of identity documents for the citizens of the Republic of
Moldova. Thus, the Regulation on the Issuance of Identity Documents and Records of the Residents of the
Republic of Moldova establishes that minors and those placed under guardianship or curator is identified by
the legal representative on the basis of the declaration on his own responsibility, submitted in writing to the
person in charge of the subdivision of the Public Services Agency or the diplomatic mission or consular office
of the Republic of Moldova. As for children without parental care or are at state maintenance, they shall be
identified by the tutelage authority or the administration of that institution.97
For people who have reached the age of majority and until the time of the address for the completion of
the identity card have not been identified or their previous identification can not be proved, identification is
made on the basis of the written declaration on the sole responsibility of the applicant and the spouse (wife),
or of the applicant, and a I-III-degree relatives. In such cases, if possible, additional supporting documents
shall be provided, issued by the local public administration authority or other state institution, who has
information about the person concerned (military record, pensioner card, certificate from the place of study or
work, travel title, etc.) if they contribute to determining the identity of the person. If the person to be identified
is the holder of an identity document issued by the authorities of another State, this act is equivalent to
declaration husband (wife) or to the applicant's I-III relative.98
94 Law no. 198 of 26.07.2007 with regard to the state guaranteed legal aid, art. 6 par. (2) 95 Ibid., Art. 19 and 21 96 Ibid., Art. 22 97 To see pt. 32, 33 of the Regulation on issuance of identity documents and the record of the inhabitants of the Republic of
Moldova approved by the Government Decision no. 125 of 18.02.2013. 98 Ibid., Paragraph 34.
47
For people undergoing constraint treatment, preventive arrest, in detention or detained by the competent
bodies and who do not have identity papers on them, identification shall be carried out by that institution,with
an opinion to that effect.
Identification information is used by state information resources (automated and non-automated).99
If it is not possible to identify the person according to the order established by the Regulation on the
Issuance of Identity Documents and Records of the Residents of the Republic of Moldova, the identity of the
person is determined by the court.100
Regarding asylum seekers and the beneficiaries of international protection shall apply the provisions of
Law no. 270 of 18.12.2008 on asylum in the Republic of Moldova which provides for the procedure of
documenting these categories of persons with identity papers. Until the asylum application is resolved, the
authorities shall issue to the asylum seeker a temporary identity document, attesting to his / her status as an
asylum seeker, but not his true identity.
This condition results from the fact, that in the absence of documents certifying the identity of the
applicant, the temporary identity document shall state that the identity of the holder is declared. The
authenticity of the identity is subsequently verified jointly with the competent authorities.
If the identity of the applicant can not be substantiated, the mention of the declared identity shall be kept
in the identity document until it is proved by confirmatory documents.101
The legal framework of the Republic of Moldova does not provide for a special procedure for
determining the identity of the persons entering the procedure for the recognition of the status of stateless
persons.
3.3 Rights of stateless persons and stateless persons recognized in the Republic of Moldova
3.3.1 Rights of applicants for stateless status
The adoption by the Republic of Moldova of the procedure for recognizing statelessness has defined a
new category of persons - applicants for stateless status - transition status, in which the person is still not
recognized as a stateless person, but at the same timecan not be considered as a citizen.
The legislation of the Republic of Moldova expressly provides for this category of persons the following
rights:
- to be in the Republic of Moldova throughout the examination of the application;
- not to be removed from the territory of the Republic of Moldova except in cases where there are reasons
of national security or public order;
99 Ibid., Paragraph 35. 100 Ibid., Paragraph 36. 101 See Art. 28 lit. j) and art. 32 paragraph (1) of Law no. 270 of 18.12.2008 on asylum in the Republic of Moldova.
48
- to work;
- to receive the services of an interpreter for free during the entire examination period of the application;
- to be informed in writing, at the time of filing the application, in a language he understands or is
reasonably supposed to understand, about rights and the obligations it has during the procedure for the
recognition of statelessness status;
- to use in verbal communication either in the mother tongue or in another language they possess;
- the right to appeal to the court of law for the decision to reject the application for recognition of the
status of stateless person.102
During the status recognition procedure for stateless persons, in order to identify and confirm the
domicile on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, the applicant is issued with the temporary identity
document - the confirmation certificate of the applicant for stateless status.
3.3.1.1 Detention
The routine detention of persons requesting protection on grounds of statelessness is arbitrary.
Statelessness by its very nature severely restricts access to identity papers and the basic journey that citizens
normally have. More, stateless persons are often without a legal residence in any country. Starting from the
ones outlined, detention can not be used as a general justification for such persons. Article 9 of the
International Covenant on Civil Rights and policies guaranteeing the right to freedom and security of the
person, prohibits both illegal and arbitrary detention.
For detention to be lawful, it must be governed by national law, preferably with maximum limits set for
this detention and subject to periodic review under judicial control.
For detention not to be arbitrary, it must be necessary in each individual case, reasonable in all
circumstances, proportionate and non-discriminatory. Indefinitely forms as well as mandatory detention are
arbitrary per se.103
Detention is, thus, a measure of last resort and can only be justified when other less invasive measures
or coercion have been taken into account and considered insufficient to protect the legal government objective
pursued by detention. Alternatives to detention - from reporting obligations or security systems / bonds to
structured Community surveillance and / or case management programs - are part of any assessment of the
necessity and proportionality of the detention. The general principles on detention apply a fortiori to children
who, in principle, will not be held in any way.104
The legislation of the Republic of Moldova defines public custody as a measure to restrict freedom of
movement, disposed by the court against a foreigner who:
102 See Art. 873 par. (1 and art. 878 par. (2) of Law no. 200 from 16.07.2010 on the regime of foreigners in the Republic of Moldova 103 UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons, par. 112. 104 Ibid., Par. 113.
49
- did not execute the return decision or could not be returned within the period prescribed by law;
- has passed or attempted to cross the state border illegally;
- has entered the country in the period previously prohibited;
- whose identity could not be established;
- has been declared undesirable;
- against whom expulsion was ordered or if there is a risk of absconding it.105
The maximum period of custody of the alien against whom the return measure was ordered may not
exceed 6 months, and in the case of the alien who was declared undesirable, the maximum period of custody
may not exceed 12 months.106
Unaccompanied minors and families with minors can be taken into custody only as a last resort and for
as short a period as possible. The child's superior interest is a primary consideration in the context of taking
custody of minors. Minors in custody have access to education and educational programs, taking into account
the needs of ethnic, cultural, their religion, their age and their state of health. Families taken into custody
receive separate accommodation that ensure an appropriate level of privacy.107
Release from public custody is based on the decision of the Migration Bureau and asylum in the case of
expiration of the term in public custody, and in cases when it disappeared reason, which was the basis for
issuing of the decision taking into public custody.108
The legislation of the Republic of Moldova expressly stipulates the right of the applicant for status of
stateless person on the territory of the Republic of Moldova throughout the examination of the application.
Thus, as regards the applicants for statelessness, may not be applied the measure of taking custody, until the
final settlement of the request for recognition of the status of stateless person. At the same time, the cases of
keeping in custody of aliens who filed the application for recognition of the status of stateless person under
public custody were registered. In such cases, the legal framework does not provide immediate release of
foreigners seeking recognition of statelessness in custody, release from public custody under general
conditions established by the legislation in force.
3.3.1.2 Expulsion
Article 31 (1) of the 1954 Convention prohibits the Contracting States from expelling a stateless person
who is habitually resident in their territory only for reasons of national security or public order. The expulsion
of this stateless person will only take place in the execution of a decision rendered by the procedure provided
by the law. The stateless person has the right to testify to be acquitted, to attack the decision on expulsion and
to be represented by a person specifically designated by the competent authority. In addition, a stateless person
105 See Art. 64 par. (1) of the Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova. 106 Ibid., Art. 64, par. (6). 107 Ibid., Art. 641 108 Ibid., Art. 642
50
is entitled to a reasonable period to apply for legal admission in another country. The State implementing
expulsion, as the case may be, may apply domestic order measures.109
The legislation of the Republic of Moldova provides that stateless persons legally resident on the
territory of the Republic of Moldova can not be expelled, unless there are reasons of national security or public
order. The expulsion measure may only be ordered by the court.110
The same rule applies to applicants for stateless persons who can not be removed from the territory of
the Republic of Moldova except in cases where there are reasons of national security or public order.111
During the implementation of the national procedure for the recognition of stateless status, no cases of
expulsion from the territory of the Republic of Moldova of stateless persons or recognized stateless persons
were recorded.
3.3.2 Fundamental rights, freedoms and duties of stateless persons
Fundamental human rights apply to all persons irrespective of their status or type of residence in a
particular jurisdiction. These include, for example, the principle of non-discrimination and the prohibition of
torture. However, in practice, states often limit the exercise of certain rights for citizens, while other rights
extend to foreigners, including stateless persons. The 1954 Convention seeks to ensure that stateless persons
are granted certain fundamental rights in their country of residence. The 1954 Convention states that its
provisions will apply to stateless persons "without discrimination based on race, religion or country of origin"
(Article 3). Every stateless person is also required to comply with the laws and regulations of the country
where he is (Article 2). Assuming that obligation is fulfilled, Article 7 (1) of the Convention establishes the
basic level of protection to which a stateless person is entitled. It provides that, unless the Convention
explicitly contains more favorable conditions, "a State Party shall accord to the stateless person the same
treatment as that accorded to aliens in general". In relation to most of the rights listed in the 1954 Convention,
stateless persons must have at least the same rights and benefits as those guaranteed to aliens, in particular
those relating to the right to paid employment (Articles 17, 18, 19), education state (apart from primary
education) (Article 22), shelter (Article 21) and right to free movement (Article 26). For other specific rights,
States Parties are encouraged to grant stateless residents who are permanent residents on their territory
standard treatment compared to that offered to citizens of the State, in particular the right to freedom of
religious worship (Article 4), artistic rights and industrial property Article 14), access to justice (Article 16),
and primary education (Article 22), during the legal stay of stateless persons, should be accorded a standard
109 See Art. 31 (1) - (3) of the Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons of 28.09.1954 110 See Art. 63, par. (11) of the Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova. 111 Ibid., Art. 873 par. (1).
51
of treatment comparable to that accorded to State nationals in respect of State aid 23), labor law and social
protection (Article 24).112
Referring to the legislation of the Republic of Moldova, constitutional provisions declare equal rights
for citizens, foreign citizens and stateless persons (Article 19). However, the same article allows some
exceptions, if they are set by law. An analysis of the Moldovan legal framework demonstrates that these
exceptions are in line with international best practices and mainly refers to the possible political involvement
of a stateless person.113
The basic normative act is Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova
guaranteeing the stateless persons the following rights and freedoms:
- the right to work and its protection (Article 842);
- the right to rest and to health (Article 843);
- the right to social security (Article 844);
- the right to domicile (Article 845);
- the right to property and the right to intellectual property (Article 846);
- the right to education (Article 847);
- the right to association (Article 848);
- the right to freedom of conscience and opinion (Article 849);
- the right to family (Article 8410);
- the right to free movement throughout the Republic of Moldova (Article 8411);
- the right to inviolability of the person and the dwelling (Article 8412);
- procedural rights in the trial (Article 8413).
It should be noted that stateless persons do not have the right to elect and to be elected in the legislative,
executive or local public administration bodies, nor to participate in universal suffrage, can not be party
members or other social- political. Also, stateless persons can not satisfy the military service in the armed
forces of the Republic of Moldova (Article 841 (8), (9), (10)).
The legislation of the Republic of Moldova offers the possibility for the stateless persons to benefit,
through the central public administration authorities and the local public administration authorities, of
activities in the local society, such as:
a) socio-cultural accommodation sessions (training on national values and traditions, the political and
administrative organization of the Republic of Moldova);
112 Eugen Osmochescu, "Legislation of the Republic of Moldova in the perspective of the United Nations Conventions on
Statelessness", 2010, par. 36. 113Ibid., Par. 37.
52
b) language courses;
c) information and advice on how to access the labor market, medical services and social protection
measures.114
3.3.3 Identity documents
The Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons of 28.09.1954 stipulates that Contracting States must
issue identity papers to every individual who is in their territory and who does not have a valid travel
document. Article 28 states that Contracting States shall issue to stateless persons with habitual residence in
their territory travel documents intended for travelers outside that territory, except where compelling reasons
of national security or public policy do not preclude them. The release of the document does not involve the
granting of citizenship, does not change the status of the individual and does not give the right to diplomatic
protection. The second part of Article 28 invites states to issue travel documents to any stateless person on
their territory even to non-habitual residents. In particular, States are required to examine the possibility of
issuing travel documents under the Convention to stateless persons who are in their territory and who are
unable to obtain a travel document from their country of habitual residence.
Law no. 273 from 09.11.1994 on the identity documents of the national passport system115 establishes
the types and terms of validity of the identity documents issued to the stateless persons on the territory of the
Republic of Moldova.
Thus, on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, the stateless persons are issued the following identity
documents: i) the temporary residence permit - to the stateless persons who have been granted or extended, as
the case may be, the right of temporary residence on the territory of the Republic of Moldova; ii) identity card
for stateless persons - stateless persons who have been granted the right of permanent residence on the territory
of the Republic of Moldova or their status as stateless persons was recognized under the conditions of Law
no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova; iii) travel document - stateless
persons who have been granted the right to permanent residence on the territory of the Republic of Moldova
or have been recognized as stateless persons under the conditions of Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime
of aliens in the Republic of Moldova.
The travel document proves the identity and status of a stateless person entitled to stay in the Republic
of Moldova and entitles him / her to leave and enter the country through any state border crossing point open
to international travel traffic.
Travel documents for stateless persons as well as passports of citizens of the Republic of Moldova are
issued for a period of 7 years, and for children up to 7 years of age - for a period of 4 years.
114 See Art. art. 2 par. (1), art. 5 par. (1), art. 15 par. (1) of the Law no. 274 of 27.12.2011 regarding the integration of foreigners
in the Republic of Moldova. 115 http://lex.justice.md/md/311641/
53
ID cards for stateless persons as well as ID cards for citizens of the Republic of Moldova are issued for
a term of validity: a) from birth up to 10 years; b) from 10 to 16 years; c) from 16 to 25 years of age; d) from
25 to 45 years; e) from 45 - for life.
Regarding the validity of the temporary residence permit issued to the stateless persons, this is limited
to the period for which the holder was granted or, as the case may be, extended the temporary residence permit
in the Republic of Moldova. The temporary residence permit shall be renewed each time on the occasion of
the extension of the temporary residence permit.
Models of identity documents issued to stateless persons are set out in the Government Decision no. 333
of 18.03.2002 for the approval of the Concept of the Automated Information System "State Register of
Population" and the Regulation on the State Registry of the Population.116
The procedure for issuance of identity documents for stateless persons is stipulated in the Regulation on
the Issuance of Identity Documents and Records of Residents of the Republic of Moldova, approved by the
Government Decision no. 125 of 18.02.2013.117
3.3.4 Procedural safeguards for minors
Certain groups may face particular challenges in establishing their citizenship status. Age, gender and
diversity may require certain individuals to be provided with procedural and additional security guarantees to
ensure that proper decisions are made to determine statelessness.118
Children, especially unaccompanied children, may face acute challenges in communicating basic facts
about their citizenship. The UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless People recommends that States
establishing procedures for determining statelessness respect the principle of pursuing the best interests of the
child when considering the status of citizenship and the need to protect children through statelessness.
Additional procedural and probative safeguards for child applicants include prioritization of their applications,
making legal representatives, interviewers and interpreters properly trained, as well as assuming a greater
share of the burden of proof by the state.119
For the purposes of the Aliens' Regime Act, "unaccompanied minor" means a foreigner under the age
of eighteen who enters the territory of the Republic of Moldova without being accompanied by an adult who
is responsible for him by law or legal act and for as long as is not effectively taken into care by such a person;
this term also designates the minor who is left unaccompanied after entering the territory of the Republic of
Moldova.120
Regarding children entering the procedure for recognition of statelessness status, the legislation of the
Republic of Moldova expressly provides the requirement for interviewing the minor in the presence of a
116 http://lex.justice.md/viewdoc.php?action=view&view=doc&id=296142&lang=1 117 http://lex.justice.md/md/346754/ 118 UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons, par. 118. 119 Ibid., Par. 119. 120 See Art. 3 of the Law no. 200 of 16.07.2010 on the regime of aliens in the Republic of Moldova.
54
mature person. Unaccompanied minors are usually assisted during the interview by the representative of the
institution in which they are placed, the latter being appointed by the administration of the institution and in
the case of minors accompanied by one of the parents or a representative whose mandate derives from the law
or from -a legal act.121
The case of the unaccompanied minor who has been recognized as a stateless person refers to the
guardianship authority at the child's place of residence in order to ensure respect for his / her legitimate rights
and interests.122
During the application of the statelessness recognition procedure on the territory of the Republic of
Moldova, as of 10 February 2012, no case has been registered for submitting the application for recognition
of the status of stateless persons by unaccompanied minors. At the same time, in the recent history of applying
statelessness procedures, only one case of requesting the recognition of the stateless status of a minor
accompanied by the curator was recorded.
CASE STUDY
O.G., male, 15 years old
Country of origin: Russian Federation
O.G. is 16 years old. He was born in the Russian Federation. He came to Moldova when he was 2 years
old with his mother. His mother left him in the education of a known woman and returned to the Russian
Federation. When O.G. She was 7 years old, my mother disappeared, and since then she knows nothing about
her whereabouts. In connection with this, O.G. guardianship was established.
At the age of 15 O.G. addressed the authorities of the Republic of Moldova for the issuance of the
identity card of the citizen of the Republic of Moldova but was refused because he did not appear in the State
Register of Population as a citizen of the Republic of Moldova and should have established his legal status.
O.G. has submitted, through the curator, the application for recognition of the status of stateless person to the
Bureau for Migration and Asylum. Given that O.G was born in the Russian Federation and his mother
originated in the Republic of Belarus, OG's membership was initiated. to the citizenship of these countries.
As a result of the checks, it was established that neither the Russian Federation nor the Republic of
Belarus admitted OG. as its citizen. According to the legislation of the Republic of Moldova, the stateless
child under the tutelage of the citizens of the Republic of Moldova automatically becomes a citizen of the
Republic of Moldova. Thus, the official position of the authorities of the Russian Federation and the Republic
121 Ibid., Art. 874 par. (4). 122 Ibid., Art. 877 par. (4).
55
of Belarus vis-à-vis the citizenship of O.G. allowed the authorities of the Republic of Moldova to automatically
recognize OG. as its citizen.
Following the obtaining of identity documents of the citizen of the Republic of Moldova, O.G. has
withdrawn the application for recognition of statelessness status, the procedure for recognizing stateless status
being terminated.
The procedures for identification, assessment, assistance, referral, monitoring and evidence of children
at risk and of children separated from their parents, as well as the authorities and structures responsible for the
application of these procedures are established by the Law no. 140 of 14.06.2013 concerning the special
protection of children at risk and children separated from their parents.According to this law, the children,
they shall enjoy protection without discrimination, regardless of their race, color, sex, language, religion,
political or other opinion, nationality, ethnicity or social origin, their status as a result of their birth, (family,
educational institution, social service, medical institution, community, etc.)123, and the type of disability, the
specific aspects of raising and educating children, their parents or other legal representatives, their place of
residence.
Despite the fact that the legal framework of the Republic of Moldova provides for the possibility of
interviewing an unaccompanied minor in the procedure for the recognition of stateless status, we can not talk
about clarity regarding the access of unaccompanied minors to the procedure. The existing legal framework
does not say anything in this chapter and we mean that the unaccompanied minor can access the procedure for
recognition of the of the statelessness person only as a result of determination of his / her status as child
without parental care in accordance with the provisions of the Law on Special Protection of Children at Risk
and children separated from parents. At the same time, the Law no. 1024 from 02.06.2000 of the citizenship
of the Republic of Moldova provides the guarantee that the children found on the territory of the Republic of
Moldova are considered citizens of the Republic until the age of 18 years is proved (Article 11 paragraph (2)).
Analyzing this norm in the light of one of the general principles stipulated in the Law of the Citizenship of the
Republic of Moldova - avoidance of statelessness (Article 7, letter d)), it follows that any unaccompanied
child, who can not be identified as a citizen of another state, on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, is
automatically recognized as a citizen of the Republic of Moldova.Thus, in order to ensure the respect of the
child’ssuperior interest regarding any child on the territory of the Republic of Moldova who is left without
adult care and in the case of which it is not possible to establish with certainty the nationality of a state, the
identification and documentation procedures with identity documents provided for the citizens of the Republic
of Moldova are to be applied.
123 http://lex.justice.md/document_rom.php?id=44B9F30E:7AC17731
56
However, there is no clarity how to apply the provisions of Art. 11 par. (2) of the Moldovan citizenship
law. Currently, the regulatory framework does not provide for a clear and well-defined mechanism for the
application of this legal provision. Currently, the regulatory framework does not provide for a clear and well-
defined mechanism for the application of this legal provision. At the same time, the legal framework does not
say anything about the authority that would be responsible for solving such cases, and it is not clear to which
authority belongs the attribution of the citizenship recognition of the Republic of Moldova in cases of children
found on the territory of the Republic of Moldova.In this respect, state authorities should develop a mechanism
to implement the provisions of art. 11 par. (2) of the Law on the Citizenship of the Republic of Moldova with
the determination of the competencies of the responsible authorities.
57
IV. REDUCTION AND PREVENTION OF THE STATELESSNESS IN THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA
4.1. The national legal framework of the Republic of Moldova on the right to citizenship and the
reduction of statelessness.
Prevention of statelessness and the protection of stateless persons should be a priority for all states.
In the Republic of Moldova, the institution of citizenship was first defined in the Law no. 596 of 5 June
1991 on the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, according to which the citizenship determines the
permanent political and juridical relations between a natural person and the Republic of Moldova who find
their expression in their reciprocal124 rights and obligations.
As well the Article 2 of the Law also stipulates the persons who had the right to belong to the citizenship
of the Republic of Moldova, namely:
- persons who until June 28, 1940, lived on the territory of Bessarabia, northern Bucovina, Herţa county
and R.S.S.M. and their descendants if at the date of the adoption of this Law they were residing on the territory
of the Republic of Moldova;
- persons who were born on the territory of the republic or at least one of the parents, grandparents were
born in the above-mentioned territory and if they are not citizens of another state.
- persons married before June 23, 1990, with citizens of the Republic of Moldova or their descendants,
and persons who have returned to the country at the request of the President of the Republic of Moldova or
the Government of the republic;
- other persons who, prior to the adoption of the Declaration of Sovereignty of the Republic of Moldova,
including the date of its adoption, 23 June 1990, have permanently lived on the territory of the Republic of
Moldova and have a permanent place of work or another legal source of existence. These people will decide
about the citizenship during one year;
- persons who have acquired citizenship of the Republic of Moldova in accordance with this Law.
An important aspect is that the precautions of the given Law gave the person the right to renounce or
change citizenship (Article 22) and the right to travel anywhere in the world without any time limitations, and
the absence from the country does not affect the validity of the citizenship (Article 19), also does not affect
the validity of citizenship even at the end and dissolution of marriage. In addition, the Moldovan legislation
allowed, under certain circumstances, multiple citizenship (Article 6).
Also, the law mentioned other grounds for acquiring citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, such as:
birth, repatriation, grant on demand and reintegration into the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova.
124 Law no. 596 of 5 June 1991 on the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova. In: Moldova's Government Newspaper "Moldova
Suverană", No. 138 of 04.07.1991, art.1,
http://lex.justice.md/index.php?action=view&view=doc&lang=1&id=311903
58
The next step in the development of the citizenship institution in the Republic of Moldova was the
adoption on 29 July 1994 of the Constitution of the Republic of Moldova. Article 17 of the Constitution
guarantees two fundamental rights of citizens: "No one can be arbitrarily deprived of his or her nationality
and the right to change the citizenship" and "the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova is acquired, is
preserved or is lost under the conditions stipulated by the organic law ".125
Another important step was the ratification by the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova of the
European Convention on Nationality, concluded at Strasbourg on 6 November 1997.126
As a result of the ratification of the Convention, on June 2, 2000, the Moldovan Parliament adopted the
Moldovan Citizenship Law No. 1024. The basic principles underlying this law are the right of every person
to a citizenship, the non-discrimination of the citizens, regardless of the grounds for acquiring the citizenship,
the inadmissibility of the arbitrary deprivation of the person of his nationality and the right to change his
nationality, the avoidance of statelessness, effects by changing the citizenship of one of the spouses on the
nationality of the other spouse or on the nationality of the child if there is no written request in this sense from
the part of the parents.
In the effort to avoid statelessness through the succession of states through the Law no.307 of December
25, 2008, the Republic of Moldova adhered to the Council of Europe Convention regarding the avoidance of
statelessness concerning the succession of states adopted on 19 May 2006.127
It is important to note that on September 3, 2010, through the Government Decision no. 792 was
approved the Migration and Asylum Action Plan for 2010-2011, which provided the need to adjust the national
legislative framework to international requirements, namely adherence of the Republic of Moldova to the
Convention on the Reduction of statelessness, concluded on 30 August 1961 in New York. This provision was
later reflected in both the National Strategy on Migration and Asylum for 2011-2020128 and the Action Plan
for 2011-2015 on the implementation of the National Strategy on Migration and Asylum (2011-2020)129.
As a result of these provisions, on December 8, 2011, the Parliament passed the Law on the Accession
of the Republic of Moldova to the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, concluded in New York on
30 August 1961130.
125 http://lex.justice.md/document_rom.php?id=44B9F30E:7AC17731 126 Parliament's decision no. 621 of 14.10.1999 on the ratification of the European Convention on Nationality, done at Strasbourg
on 6 November 1997. In the Official Gazette of the Republic of Moldova, 04.11.1999, no. 120. 127 Council of Europe Convention on the Avoidance of Statelessness on the Succession of States adopted on 19 May 2006. The
Republic of Moldova acceded by Law No.307 of 25.12.2008. http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/Html/200.htm. 128 Government Decision No.655 of 8 September 2011 on the approval of the National Strategy on Migration and Asylum (2011-
2020). In the Official Gazette of the Republic of Moldova, 16.09.2011, No. 152-155. 129 Government Decision No 1009 of 26 December 2011 on the approval of the Action Plan for 2011-2015 on the implementation
of the National Strategy on Migration and Asylum (2011-2020). In the Official Gazette of the Republic of Moldova, 06.01.2012, No.
1-6. 130 Law no. 252 of 8 December 2011 on the accession of the Republic of Moldova to the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness,
concluded in New York on 30 August 1961. In the Official Gazette of the Republic of Moldova, 27.01.2012, no. 21-24.
59
4.2. Acquisition and loss of citizenship according to the legislation of the Republic of Moldova and its
compatibility with international standards
a) Acquisition of the citizenship
The Convention from 1961 provides that the citizenship will be granted to persons who otherwise would
be stateless:
- by the effect of the law, at birth, to a person born on the territory of the state;
- by the effect of the law, at a defined age, to a person born on the territory of the state, under the
conditions of the national legislation;
- on request, to a person born on the territory of the State (the application may be conditioned by one or
more of the following: a fixed term of lodging the application, specific residence requirements, lack of criminal
sentences of a prescribed nature and / or the fact that the person was always stateless);
- at birth, the legitimate child whose mother has the nationality of the state in which the child was born;
- by inheritance if the individual can not obtain the nationality of the State Party in the territory of which
he was born on the basis of age or residence requirements (this may be conditioned by one or more of the
following: a fixed period for lodging the application, specific residence requirements and / or the fact that the
person has always been stateless);
- children found on the territory of the State Party;
- by law, at birth, to a person born elsewhere, if the nationality of one of the parents at the time of birth
was a State Party;
- on request, under national law, to a person born elsewhere if the nationality of one of the parents at the
time of birth was the State Party (the application may be conditioned by one or more of the following: a fixed
term for lodging the application, specific residence, lack of convictions for a crime against state security and
/ or the fact that the person has always been stateless)131.
Although at the time of the adoption of the Citizenship Act, the Republic of Moldova was not a party of
the Convention regarding the Reduction of the Status of Statelessness, there are no gaps in the legislation
regarding the problem of the reduction and prevention of statelessness.
According to the Citizenship Act, the citizenship is acquired through: birth; Recognition; adoption;
regaining; naturalization, as well as under international agreements to which the Republic of Moldova is a
party (Article 10)132.
131 Eugen Osmochescu. Legislation of the Republic of Moldova from the perspective of the Conventions of the United Nations on
Statelessness. Chisinau 2010, p.18. 132 The Law on Citizenship of the Republic of Moldova no. 1024 of 2 June 2000. In the Official Gazette of the Republic of Moldova,
10.08.2000, no.9, art.10.
60
Acquiring citizenship by birth. The Citizenship Act establishes the principle of sanguine justification
for granting the citizenship. However, Article 11 of the Law states, that a citizen of the Republic of Moldova
will be considered a child born on the territory of the Republic of Moldova from parents who have the
nationality of another state, both are stateless or one of which is stateless and the other foreign citizen, where
the parent's nationality does not grant the child's nationality.
The same article establishes that a child found on the territory of the Republic of Moldova is considered
to be a citizen of the Republic of Moldova, as long as the contrary is not proven until reaching the age of 18.
These rules should be interpreted in accordance with one of the basic principles of the law - the prevention of
statelessness. In any case, the child would have been granted the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova in
the situations described above, having the option to choose, if one of the parents (possibly both parents) is a
foreigner. The law seems to embrace the most situations in which a child born in Moldova or from parents
from Moldova could otherwise become stateless133.
Acquisition of the citizenship through recognition. Article 12 of the Act stipulates that citizens of the
Republic of Moldova are recognized as having acquired and retained this nationality under the previous
legislation as well as persons who have acquired the citizenship in accordance with this law.
Similarly, citizens who have expressed their wish to become citizens of the Republic of Moldova are
recognized as citizens of the Republic of Moldova, namely:
a) persons born on the territory of the Republic of Moldova or persons one of whose parents or
grandparents was born on the named territory;
b) persons who until June 28, 1940, lived in Bessarabia, Northern Bucovina, in Herţa county and in
the R.S.S.M., their descendants;
c) deportees or refugees from the territory of the Republic of Moldova of 28 June 1940, as well as
their followers;
d) persons who, on June 23, 1990, lived legally and habitually on the territory of the Republic of
Moldova and continue to live in the present.
Acquisition of the citizenship through adoption. Article 13 of the Citizenship Act establishes that a
stateless child automatically acquires the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova through adoption if the
adopters (adopter) are citizens of the Republic of Moldova.
On the citizenship of a stateless child adopted by spouses one of whom is a citizen of the Republic of
Moldova, and the other a foreign citizen decide by common accord, the adopters. If the adopters do not agree,
on the child's membership to the Republic of Moldova will decide by the court, taking into account the interests
of the child. In the case of the child who has reached the age of 14, his / her consent is authenticated by the
notary.
133 Eugen Osmochescu. Legislation of the Republic of Moldova in the perspective of the Conventions of the United Nations on
Statelessness. Chisinau 2010, p.19
61
A foreign citizen child enrolled by both or one of them is a citizen of the Republic of Moldova or a
citizen of the Republic of Moldova, and the other foreign citizen or stateless person may become a citizen of
the Republic of Moldova if he renounces the citizenship of the foreign state except in the cases provided by
the agreements international relations to which the Republic of Moldova is a party.
Acquisition of the citizenship by children on whom guardianship is established. According to art.15
of the Law, the stateless child under the tutelage of citizens of the Republic of Moldova automatically becomes
a citizen of the Republic of Moldova (Article 15 paragraph (1)).
The citizenship of the Republic of Moldova will be granted even if one of the tutors is a citizen of the
Republic of Moldova and the other stateless person (Article 15 paragraph (2)).
If the stateless child is under the guardianship of spouses one of whom is a citizen of the Republic of
Moldova and the other foreign citizen applies the citizenship as if the child was adopted by a citizen husband
of the Republic of Moldova and another foreigner. In the case of a child who has reached the age of 14, his /
her consent is authenticated by the notary.
Article 15 also establishes the way of granting citizenship the foreign citizen child who is under the
guardianship of both spouses or only one of them being a citizen of the Republic of Moldova or one being a
citizen of the Republic of Moldova. Thus, he may become a citizen of the Republic of Moldova if he renounces
at the citizenship of the foreign state.
Acquisition of citizenship by naturalization. Article 17 (1) of the Citizenship Act stipulates that the
citizenship of the Republic of Moldova may be granted on request to a foreign citizen who is legally and
habitually resident on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, who knows and complies with the provisions
of the Constitution, passed the test for assessing the level of knowledge of the language has legal sources of
income and has been domiciled on the territory of the Republic of Moldova for at least the last 10 years. In
the case of stateless persons, refugees, beneficiaries of humanitarian protection and political asylum, this term
is 8 years from the moment of obtaining status in the Republic of Moldova.
The term will be 3 years in the case of a marriage with a Moldovan citizen or if the person is domiciled
in the Republic of Moldova for the same term with the parents / children (including foreigners or foster)
citizens of the Republic of Moldova. For people under 18, the term will be 5 years.
As a result of the December 2016 amendments, the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova can be
granted to foreign citizens who have made investments in at least one of the strategic development areas of
the Republic of Moldova approved by the Government. The minimum investment amount is to be set by the
Government.134
134 http://lex.justice.md/md/368101/
62
Article 19 of the Law describes the way in which the citizenship is granted for the child whose parents
acquire the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, namely, the child born of foreign nationals or stateless
persons who acquire citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, acquires citizenship on the same date as their
parents. If only one of the parents acquires the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, the parents will jointly
decide on the citizenship of the child. If the parents do not agree, the child's jurisdiction in the Republic of
Moldova will be decided by the court, taking into account the interests of the child, if there is an express
statement of the parents in this respect. For the child who has reached the age of 14, his / her consent must be
authenticated by the notary.
Recovering citizenshipSimilarly, the Citizenship Act also provides cases of recovering citizenship.
Thus, according to art. 16 of the person who previously had the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova can
recover it upon request, keeping his foreign citizenship on request, only if he has not committed international
crimes, military or crimes against humanity, was not involved in terrorist activity, has been convicted of
deprivation of liberty for premeditated crime and has a criminal record or is under criminal prosecution at the
time of the examination of the application, does not engage in activities that endanger the security of the state,
public order, health and morality of the population.
At the same time, para. (2) of the same article stipulates that the person to whom the citizenship of the
Republic of Moldova has been withdrawn due to the fact that he has committed particularly serious deeds
causing damage to the state, can notrecover it.
From the analysis of the legal provisions set out above, we can conclude that in the matter of reducing
and preventing statelessness, the Moldovan citizenship law complies with the Convention of 1961 on the
Reduction of Statelessness and the European Convention on Citizenship of 1997.
b) Loss of citizenship
According to the Convention 1961 (Article 5-8), loss or renunciation of citizenship must be conditional
upon prior possession or securing the acquisition of another citizenship. An exception can be made in the case
of the naturalization of persons who, despite formal notifications and time limits, are staying abroad for a
certain number of years and do not express their intention to keep citizenship. A naturalized person in this
case is a person who acquired the nationality after filing the application to that State Party and that State Party
could refuse the application. Loss of citizenship can only take place in accordance with the law and
accompanied by full procedural safeguards, such as the right to a fair trial before a court or other independent
body. Citizenship legislation should stipulate that no citizen can renounce to his or her citizenship without
acquiring any other citizenship or receiving formal and written assurances from the relevant authorities that
he / she will acquire another nationality.135
135 Eugen Osmochescu. Legislation of the Republic of Moldova in the perspective of the United Nations Conventions on
Statelessness. Chisinau 2010, p.23.
63
According to Article 21 of the Citizenship Act, citizenship can be lost through: renunciation, withdrawal
or in accordance with international treaties to which the Republic of Moldova is a party.
Renunciation at the Republic of Moldova citizenship
Article 22 of the Law on Citizenship allows the application of the mechanism on renunciation only on
condition that a certificate of possession or acquisition of the nationality of another State or the guarantee of
the nationality of another State is presented.At the same time, if the person who was granted the renunciation
of the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova, despite the guarantee, will not acquire the citizenship ofanother
state, ie he will become stateless, the part of the decree of the President of the Republic of Moldova on the
approval of the citizenship renunciation of the Republic of Moldova regarding this person will be abrogated
in the established mode.
These provisions are in line with Article 7.1 (a) of the 1961 Convention.
Withdrawal of the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova
Article 23 paragraph (1) of the Law on Citizenship allows the withdrawal of Republic of Moldova
citizenship by a decree of the Republic of Moldova President only in cases where the person:
a) acquired the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova fraudulently, through false information or by
concealing a relevant fact, proved in court;
b) voluntarilyenrolled in foreign armed forces;
c) has committed particularly serious deeds that bring about essential damage to the state;
d) does not observe the conditions for carrying out and maintaining the investment.
However, the same article states that the second, third and fourth criteria will not serve as a legal basis
for the withdrawal of citizenship if the person becomes stateless. This provision does not apply if the
citizenship has been acquired in violation of law, ie fraudulently, ie by false information or by concealing a
relevant fact (Article 23 (2)).
The article also states that the withdrawal of the citizenship of the Republic of Moldova has no effect
on the citizenship of the husband and the child of the person (Article 23 paragraph (3)).
Thus, we can conclude that the provisions are fully in line with the Convention 1961 on the Reduction
of Statelessness and the European Convention 1997 on citizenship.
4.3. Reducing the cases of statelessness
"Reducing "statelessness means any effort made to find solutions to existing cases. One of the methods
by which this can be achieved is a large-scale campaign to reduce statelessness. Various techniques have been
64
applied throughout the world over the past few years. The overall impact is impressive, "thus," more than 3.5
million people were able to acquire or confirm their citizenship between 2004-2008. "136
Another means of reducing statelessness, which is less visible from the beginning, but of great
importance is individual naturalization.
Given the importance of ensuring that everyone enjoys a citizenship, at present, international law
requires the naturalization of stateless persons to be facilitated.137
In other words, stateless persons should more easily obtain the right to naturalization towards foreigners
in general. For example, the law of many states grants stateless persons legally resident on their territory the
right to naturalization in a shorter period of time, as opposed to foreigners.
This is the case of the Republic of Moldova, which grants stateless persons the right to obtain citizenship
by naturalization, after a legal stay on the territory of the Republic of Moldova no less than 8 years on the
basis of the official documents issued. While foreign citizens are granted this right after, a regular and common
stay on the territory of the Republic of Moldova for at least 10 years. However, the 2-year term reduction is
not a very favorable condition for stateless persons.According to the data, the total number of naturalized
foreigners in 2015 amounted to 745 people. It is worth mentioning that in the total of the naturalized, stateless
persons have a weight of 64.8%, being followed by foreigners with indefinite citizenship 22.3% and the other
foreigners (those who previously held another citizenship) 12.9% (Figure 10 ).
Figure 6. Proportion of naturalized foreigners by category, 2010-2015, percent
Sourse: ASP
Stateless (Article 1 of the Convention of 1951)
Undetermined citizenship
Other foreigners
136 Refugees International, Citizens Rights for All: A Progress Report and Global Survey on Statelessness, 11 March 2009.
http://www.refworld.org/docid/49be193f2.html 137 UN Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons concluded on 28 September 1954 in New York. The Republic of Moldova
acceded by the Law no. 275 of December 27, 2011, art.
.00
20.00
40.00
60.00
80.00
100.00
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
70,270,0 69,6 69,0 67,4 64,8
23,6 22,9 22,6 22,6 22,3 22,3
6,2 7,1 7,8 8,4 10,3 12,9
Apatrid (Articolul 1 al Convenției din 1951) Cetățenie nedeterminată Alți străini
65
V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS (Experts: Olesea Cotoman, Iulian
Popov, Maria Vermis)
„Everyone has the right to a nationality. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied
the right to change his nationality.“ By these concise statements, Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights of 1948 confers on every individual, wherever he may be in the world, the right to have a legal
relationship with a state. Nationality does not just provide to people a sense of identity, but gives them the
right to state protection and many civil and political rights. Indeed, citizenship has been described as „the right
to have rights“.
Despite the existence of an international law domain regarding the procedure to obtain, lose or deny
citizenship, there are millions of people in the world who have no nationality. These people are stateless.
There is a variety of causes that can lead to statelessness, including contradictory legislation, transfer of the
territory, marriage law, administrative practices, discrimination, absence of birth registrations, deprivation of
nationality and renunciation.
According to the data of the Public Services Agency, in 2016, 1,972 persons were documented as having
the status of stateless, making up a fairly impressive share of 8.8 percent in the structure of foreigners.
At present, the legislation of the Republic of Moldova has a high level of compliance with the standards
established by the international instruments, being part of all international conventions on statelessness. Its
provisions stipulate equal rights for citizens, foreigners and stateless persons. Although at the time of accession
to the 1954 Convention, the Republic of Moldova had reservations about some of its articles, the current legal
framework is the one being in line with the best international practices.
As regards the identification, prevention and reduction of cases of statelessness, the national system
contains procedures for the identification and documentation of stateless persons in line with the international
standards and the legislation provides sufficient protection against statelessness. At present, the Republic of
Moldova is one of the few countries in Europe, and even in the world, that has a specific procedure for
recognition of the status of stateless, being recognized as a model in the region.
The main databases that serve as sources of data on the population in general, including information
regarding stateless persons, are kept by the National Bureau of Statistics, the Public Services Agency and the
Bureau for Migration and Asylum. At the same time, data on stateless persons differ from one institution to
another, and also the notions used by these institutions to define the given category of persons differ.
As concerns the reduction of cases of statelessness, we should mention that the Law on Citizenship grants
stateless persons who are legally staying in the country the right to naturalization in a shorter period of time
than to foreign citizens. However, shortening of the given period by 2 years is not a very favourable condition
for stateless persons. Similarly, they do not enjoy some additional facilities for naturalization, such as reduced
requirements concerning their knowledge of language.
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At the same time, other large scale campaigns concerning the reduction of statelessness have not been
implemented in the Republic of Moldova.
Although the authorities of the Republic of Moldova are making significant efforts to prevent cases of
statelessness by continuously improving the existing legal framework, the study revealed that in rural localities
there were identified persons, who do not have identity papers and, therefore, risk being or becoming stateless.
The main reasons for non-documentation are socio-economic ones, as well as indifference, irresponsibility of
parents, poor financial condition, religious reasons, etc.
An alarming aspect is the fact that although international and national legal norms guarantee that every
child has the right to a name and the right to acquire a nationality at birth, following the evaluation of the
situation of undocumented persons at the local level it was revealed that out of the total number of
undocumented persons about 14 % are children. Upon the analysis of the study data, it was revealed that, in
most of the detected cases, the birth of children was not registered because the mother did not have valid
identification documents.
Based on the presented conclusions and generalizations, the following recommendations can be made:
Identification and registration of stateless persons
IT IS RECOMMENDED to review the notions used by different institutions regarding stateless persons
in order to standardise them.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that the authorities provide for a mechanism of determining the identity of the
person entering the procedure of recognition of the status of stateless person. It must stipulate clear rules of
establishing the identity of persons seeking recognition of their status of stateless and have no evidentiary
document regarding their identity. In this regard, it is recommended that the authorities supplement the
existing regulatory framework with the provisions that would describe the procedure for determining the
identity of applicants for the status of stateless.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that the authorities provide for a mechanism of referral of unaccompanied
minors requesting the recognition of their status of stateless to the guardianship authority. It must stipulate
actions to be taken by the responsible authority in case of foreigners in situations when the application for
recognition of the status of stateless is filed by an unaccompanied minor. In all actions and decisions
concerning minors, the authorities must take into account that the interests of the minor should prevail.
Rights of stateless persons
67
IT IS RECOMMENDED to examine the possibility of widening the spectrum of rights enjoyed by
applicants for the status of stateless during the procedure of determination of their status. It is proposed to
provide rights of access to emergency medical assistance, access to compulsory education, access to social
assistance in the case of the family with children and unaccompanied minors.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that state authorities avoid detention of persons whose citizenship is not
determined and those who have applied for the status of stateless persons post factum, after detention. As
regards the mentioned categories of persons, it is recommended to develop and implement alternatives of
detention.
Prevention and reduction of statelessness
IT IS RECOMMENDED that state authorities facilitate the naturalization of stateless persons, based on
the rational use of residence criteria, language and shortening of the current term of 8 years of legal residence
required for naturalization.
IT IS RECOMMENDED to conduct a large scale naturalization campaign for stateless persons, as well
as the replacement of Soviet-type passports with valid identity documents.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that the authorities facilitate access to the procedures of citizenship
confirmation and issuance of identity documents, so that individuals who are eligible for citizenship are not
overcharged or excluded in case of vulnerable persons.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that the authorities elaborate a mechanism for the enforcement of Article 11
para. (2) of Law no. 1024 as of 2 June 2000 on the Citizenship of the Republic of Moldova (granting the
citizenship of the Republic of Moldova to the children found on its territory). It should provide for the
procedure of recognizing the citizenship of children found on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, the
authority responsible to examine such cases and the powers of the responsible authority in determining the
citizenship of the found children.
IT IS RECOMMENDED that the authorities review the current mechanism of the child birth registration
so that this right is ensured, irrespective of the legal status and social and economic situation of the parents.
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IT IS RECOMMENDED that the state authorities ensure the documentation of all children born on the
territory of the Republic of Moldova with identity and civil status documents. One option would be to issue
birth certificates in the maternity ward and to conduct awareness raising campaigns at the level of local public
authorities on the issue of undocumented children.
69
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Sources of law
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of Moldova, No. 1 as of 12.08.1994.
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15. Law no. 140 as of 14.06.2013 on the Special Protection of Children at Risk and Children separated from
their Parents.
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20. Government Decision no. 1009 as of 26 December 2011 on approval of the Action Plan for 2011-2015
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21. Government Decision no. 53 as of 17 January 2013 on approval of models and implementation of a new
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70
22. Government Decision no.125 as of 18.02.2013 on approval of the Regulations regarding the Issuance of
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1979. The Republic of Moldova acceded under Decision of the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova no.
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the official edition "International treaties", 1998, volume 1.
Monographs, scholarly articles
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manual for MPs.) Bucureşti: Monitorul Oficial R.A., 2010.
32. A Study of Statelessness, United Nations, Lake Success - New York, August 1949.
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Oxford. September 2009.
34. Brad K. Blitz and Maureen Lynch. Statelessness and the Benefits of Citizenship: A Comparative Study.
Oxford Brookes University, UK, June 2009.
35. Bronwen Manby.Citizenship Law in Africa a Comparative Study. Open Society Foundations, 2010.
36. Cody Claire and Heap Simon. The Universal Birth Registration campaign. Forced Migration Review,
Number 32, 2009.
37. Eugen Osmochescu. Legislaţia Republicii Moldova din perspectiva Convenţiilor Naţiunilor Unite cu
privire la apatridie. (Legislation of the Republic of Moldova from the perspective of the United Nations
Conventions on Statelessness.) Chisinau 2010.
38. Laura van Waas. The situation of stateless persons in the Middle East and North Africa. 2010.
39. Lewa Chris. North Arakan: an open prison for the Rohingya in Burma. Forced migration, number 32,
2009.
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Census 2014, Chisinau 2014.
41. Shiblak A. Arabia’s Bidoon, Statelessness and the benefits of citizenship: A comparative study, B. Blitz
(ed.), 2009.
42. UNHCR, Mapping statelessness in the United Kingdom, London 2011, p.27.
43. UNHCR, The World’s Stateless People: Questions and Answers.2006.
Collections of documents, analytical reports
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44. UN General Assembly resolutions 3274 (XXIX),10 December 1974;
45. UNHCR. Guidelines on Statelessness No. 1: The definition of "Stateless Person" in Article 1(1) of the
1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons.
46. UNHCR Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons
47. UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), UNHCR Action to Address Statelessness: A Strategy
Note, March 2010.
48. UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Global Action Plan to End Statelessness, 4 November
2014.
49. UNICEF, Every child’s birth right: Inequities and trends in birth registration, December 2013.
50. UNICEF. Birth Registration: The “first” right. 1998.
51. UNICEF. Birth Registration and Armed Conflict. 2007
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53. Analytical report „Extended Migration Profile of the Republic of Moldova for 2010-2015”, Bureau for
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analitic-pme_2010-2015_ed._2016.pdf
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the MIA, 2016.
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ANNEXES
Annex 1 INTERVIEW GUIDE (LPA, decision-makers)
• Introducing the topic of discussion
• Discussion rules: ensuring confidentiality and anonymity; audio recording required
• Data regarding the respondent (position, age)
1. 1.1 What is the number of population of the commune/locality?
1.2 About how many of them are undocumented/do not have identity cards of the RM? What type of
documents do these persons have?
2. 2.1. What ethnicities predominate in the commune/locality? But what is the predominant ethnicity of
undocumented persons?
2.2. What persons are undocumented (approximately in percentage or number):
• Children under the age of 16 ___________________________
• Adults ____________________________________
• Retired persons ________________________________
3. 3.1 What kind of problems do parents/families with undocumented children encounter (education,
health care, social care, etc)?
3.2 If children are undocumented, do they attend pre-school institutions, school?
4. 4.1. What are the sources of living of undocumented individuals (employed, work/do not work, have
savings, remittances, other sources)?
4.2. What kind of problems do undocumented persons encounter (access to services, medicine, social
protection, etc.)?
5. 5.1 Do LPAs, other institutions of the locality encounter any problems with undocumented persons?
5.2 Do undocumented person cause any problems in the commune/locality? What is the nature of
these problems (theft, alcohol abuse, drugs, violence, including family, others)?
6. 6.1 In your opinion, what are the causes/reasons for non-documentation? What do you think are the
advantages of non-documentation? And disadvantages? Do undocumented people perceive non-
documentation as an advantage/disadvantage?
6.2 What actions are required to ensure that these people are documented? What should be done at
national/local level for this purpose?
6.3 Who do you think could provide support/could be involved in ensuring documentation of the
persons?
7. What other specific information, special cases referring to undocumented/stateless persons can you
share with us?
Thank you for openness!
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Annex 2 INTERVIEW GUIDE (natural persons)
1. Name, surname
2. Date of birth 3. Gender
Female
Male
4. Country of birth 5. Nationality (ethnic origin)
6. Confession (religion)
7. Occupation
8. Mothertongue/other languages spoken
9. Residence in the Republic of Moldova (district/municipality) (locality)
10. Studies:
No studies
Primary
Gymnasium
High-school, secondary education
Vocational secondary education
Higher education
Incomplete higher education
Do you have any document that would confirm your
studies?
Yes
No
11. Family status
Single
Married
Divorced
Widow(er)
Concubinage
Do you have marriage/divorce/partner's death certificate?
Yes
No
12. Do you have birth certificate?
Yes
No (What is the reason you do not have the birth certificate?)*:
_____________________________________________
13.*Did you try to restore your birth certificate? What problems have you encountered when restoring your birth
certificate?
14. Do you have any valid or invalid identity document (passport, residence permit, identity card) or a copy of an identity
document?
Yes (Specify): _________________________________________________________________________________
No (What is the reason you do not have any identity document?)**:
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
15.** Did you try to restore your identity document? What problems have you encountered when restoring your identity
document?
16. Do you have children?
Yes***
No
17.***How many children do you
have?
18.***How many children are minors? 19.***How many children have
reached the age of majority?
20.***What kind of identity/civil status documents do the children have (please specify)?
21.*** If the children do not have any identity/civil status document – what is the reason why children do not have any
document. What problems did parents encounter when formalizing identity/civil status documents for their children?
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22. When did you come to the Republic of Moldova?
Before 23 June 1990
After 23 June 1990
23. Have you been registered with a residence visa on the territory of the Republic of Moldova?
Yes (Specify): _________________________________________________________________________________
No
24. Are you employed?
25. Do you get any assistance from the state (child allowance, pension, etc.)?
26. Have you been held liable for illegal stay/absence of identity documents? If yes, what sanctions have been applied,
how many times have you been sanctioned?
27. What problems do you encounter in the absence of identity/civil status documents?
