Which country has the most stateless people?
As seen in the table below, following the publication of improved statistical data, Côte d'Ivoire now reports the largest stateless population in the world.
Stateless nations can have large populations; for example the Kurds have an estimated population of over 30 million people, which make them one of the largest stateless nations.
They are thus “stateless nations”. Examples of stateless nations: The Kurds currently reside in Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey, but they have not established an internationally-recognized state based on their national identity.
There are plenty of stateless nations in the world today. The Kurds are one of the largest stateless nations, with over 20 million people dispersed throughout six countries: Syria, Iraq, Turkey, Iran, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. Others include Palestinians, Basques, and Roma.
Palestinians are the largest stateless community in the world. Statelessness has dominated and shaped the lives of four generations of Palestinian refugees since their exodus in 1948.
Countries with large stateless populations are Myanmar - with more than 900,000 stateless people, Burkina Faso, Mali, Ghana, Kuwait, Cote d'Ivoire, Thailand, Iraq and the Dominican Republic.
The Kurds are the world's largest ethnic group without a state of their own.
Brazil is among the few countries in the world to have in its law the recognition of a stateless person to provide documents to this person as an official citizen of the country.
Many Kurds consider the Kurdish-majority regions of northern and northeastern Syria to be Western Kurdistan (Kurdish: Rojavaye Kurdistane) and seek political autonomy within Syria (akin to Iraqi Kurdistan in Iraq) or outright independence as part of an independent Kurdistan.
Up until the end of World War I, the Palestinians were subjects of the Ottoman Empire. Like Austria-Hungary, that empire ceased to exist after the war. The Palestinians were thus rendered stateless.
What is special about the Kurds?
The Kurds are one of the world's largest peoples without a state, making up sizable minorities in Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. Their century-old quest for independence is marked by marginalization and persecution.
The Kurds are a nation without a State, but France, Germany, and Japan are examples of nation-states.

How Many Stateless People Are There Throughout the World? At the end of 2019, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (the agency mandated to prevent and reduce statelessness) counted 4.2 million stateless persons worldwide, but estimated that the actual number may be over 10 million due to underreporting.
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Table 1: Countries in Africa with over 10,000 stateless persons.
Cote d'Ivoire | 700,000 |
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South Africa | * |
According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “statelessness can occur for several reasons, including discrimination against particular ethnic or religious groups, or on the basis of gender; the emergence of new states and transfers of territory between existing states; and gaps in nationality ...
According to UNICEF data, 1 in 4 children under the age of 5 are not registered at birth. Even when they are, they may have no record of registration. Around 237 million children under the age of 5 worldwide currently do not have a birth certificate and are at risk of statelessness.
“Arbitrary deprivation of nationality”, which means deliberately moving to make a citizen stateless, is prohibited under these instruments. Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is particularly explicit on this point.
Israel enforces restrictions on the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the West Bank by employing a system of permanent, temporary and random manned checkpoints, the West Bank Barrier and by forbidding the usage of roads by Palestinians.
There are around three million Palestinians in Jordan, located overwhelmingly in the north-western part of the country, principally in the environs of Amman, Zarqa and Irbid.
Dual citizenship
Even though Jordanian nationality law permits multiple citizenship, a Jordanian national who also holds another country's citizenship may be required to renounce the foreign citizenship, under the foreign country's nationality law.
Do stateless people pay taxes?
Sometimes war and conflict drive people from their homes. Other countries with poor social institutions can't provide the paperwork or documents needed to travel abroad. One on hand, stateless people tend not to be charged taxes. They're frequently exempt from unfair regulations or things like military drafts.
In addition to violations of their right to a nationality, stateless persons are often subject to many other human rights violations. They may have difficulty accessing basic rights such as education, healthcare, employment and freedom of movement.
As a result, they often aren't allowed to go to school, see a doctor, get a job, open a bank account, buy a house or even get married. Stateless people may have difficulty accessing basic rights such as education, healthcare, employment and freedom of movement.
OMB requires five minimum categories: White, Black or African American, American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, and Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander.
The world's largest ethnic group is Han Chinese, with Mandarin being the world's most spoken language in terms of native speakers.
The largest ethnic group is the Han (91.6), and the largest non-Han minority groups are Tibetans, Mongols, and Uyghurs. These territories (Tibet, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang) are resource-rich and these ethnic groups often dispute the autonomous regions.
A certificate of identity, sometimes called an alien's passport, is a travel document issued by a country to non-citizens (also called aliens) residing within their borders who are stateless persons or otherwise unable to obtain a passport from their state of nationality (generally refugees).
Countries you can travel to
You can usually travel to all countries on a stateless person's travel document.
Permanent residency is a person's legal resident status in a country or territory of which such person is not a citizen but where they have the right to reside on a permanent basis. This is usually for a permanent period; a person with such legal status is known as a permanent resident.
The Kurdish–Turkish conflict is an armed conflict between the Republic of Turkey and various Kurdish insurgent groups who have either demanded separation from Turkey to create an independent Kurdistan, or attempted to secure autonomy and greater political and cultural rights for Kurds inside the Republic of Turkey.
Why are Kurds persecuted in Turkey?
Since World War I, Kurds in Turkey have been the victims of persistent assaults on their ethnic, cultural, religious identity and economic and political status by successive Turkish governments. With the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I, the allies created the modern Middle-East.
Because the territory that the Kurds were meant to inhabit became part of Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria. They do not wish to live under the rule of these nations, therefore they are forced to reside in relocation camps.
Accordingly, there are over 5 million Palestinians who are stateless or whose nationality status is unclear. The other distinct stateless groups include several hundred thousand Bidoon in the Persian Gulf region.
For this reason, international legal authorities continue to regard the 2 million Palestinian refugees living in Gaza and the West Bank as refugees and stateless persons.
Following the 1980 amendment to Israel's Nationality Law, Palestinians are strictly legal citizens of the State of Israel. They have "passport citizenship" rights, but are excluded from several aspects of the Jewish welfare state and are therefore denied equal "democratic citizenship".
Where do they come from? The Kurds are one of the indigenous peoples of the Mesopotamian plains and the highlands in what are now south-eastern Turkey, north-eastern Syria, northern Iraq, north-western Iran and south-western Armenia.
Kurdish is an Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo- European languages with multiple dialects spoken by Kurdish peoples in the mountainous regions of Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey.
Kurds work as unskilled laborers in large Turkish cities, as well as in Baghdad and Mosul in Iraq, and Tehran in Iran.
The Kurds are the world's largest ethnic group without a state of their own. Since their best hopes for independence were dashed a century ago, they've lived as minorities dispersed across a handful of countries in the Middle East, subject to ill treatment by Arab- and Persian-dominated governments.
Up until the end of World War I, the Palestinians were subjects of the Ottoman Empire. Like Austria-Hungary, that empire ceased to exist after the war. The Palestinians were thus rendered stateless.
What is the biggest ethnic group in the world?
The world's largest ethnic group is Han Chinese, with Mandarin being the world's most spoken language in terms of native speakers.
Tibet is one of the world's stateless nations with a larger territory —some 2 million square kilometres, to the north and east of the Himalayas—, which under full control of the the People's Republic of China .
Many Kurds consider the Kurdish-majority regions of northern and northeastern Syria to be Western Kurdistan (Kurdish: Rojavaye Kurdistane) and seek political autonomy within Syria (akin to Iraqi Kurdistan in Iraq) or outright independence as part of an independent Kurdistan.
“Arbitrary deprivation of nationality”, which means deliberately moving to make a citizen stateless, is prohibited under these instruments. Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is particularly explicit on this point.
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Statelessness.
Total population | |
---|---|
12 million (2018, est.) | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Asia and the Pacific | 1.582 million registered |
Africa | 715,089 registered |
Israel enforces restrictions on the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the West Bank by employing a system of permanent, temporary and random manned checkpoints, the West Bank Barrier and by forbidding the usage of roads by Palestinians.
Accordingly, there are over 5 million Palestinians who are stateless or whose nationality status is unclear. The other distinct stateless groups include several hundred thousand Bidoon in the Persian Gulf region.
The Kurds are a nation without a State, but France, Germany, and Japan are examples of nation-states.
1. Timor-Leste — 155.47cm (5 feet 1.28 inches) People on the Southeast Asian island of Timor are an average 155.47cm (5 feet 1.28 inches) tall. The average Timorese man is 159.79cm (5 feet 2.90 inches) tall.
The smallest major race group was Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone (0.5 million), which represented 0.2 percent of the total population.
What are the 7 races of the world?
- American Indian or Alaska Native. ...
- Asian. ...
- Black or African American. ...
- Hispanic or Latino. ...
- Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander. ...
- White.
-- Tibetans have been formally classed as one of China's 56 ethnic groups since Chinese troops were sent in 1950.
Tibet, the remote and mainly-Buddhist territory known as the "roof of the world", is governed as an autonomous region of China. Beijing claims a centuries-old sovereignty over the Himalayan region.
China absolutely cannot cause Mongolia and Tibet to break away from China's territory, and Mongolia and Tibet cannot reject China to become independent. At this time, there is not a single nation on earth except China that will sincerely develop Mongolia and Tibet."