CEDAW/C/GC/32 (l) That, in the context of durable solutions, the voluntary return home from exile of refugees and their sustainable reintegration in safety are carried out with dignity and the social and economic security of refugees are secured. 50 States who recognized the refugee status of women claimants should ensure that local integration is performed on the basis of equality and non-discrimination and that women are treated with dignity. V. Application of non-discrimination and gender equality to nationality determination processes and statelessness A. General comments 51. The Convention is a significant tool in international efforts to prevent and reduce statelessness because it particularly affects women and girls with regard to nationality rights. 51 The Convention requires full protection of women’s equality in nationality matters. Nationality is the legal bond between a person and a State and is critical to ensuring full participation in society. Nationality is also essential to guaranteeing the exercise and enjoyment of other rights, including the right to enter and reside permanently in the territory of a State and to return to that State from abroad. Article 9 of the Convention is therefore essential to the enjoyment of the full range of human rights by women. While human rights are to be enjoyed by everyone, regardless of nationality status, in practice nationality is frequently a prerequisite for the enjoyment of basic human rights. Without nationality, girls and women are subject to compounded discrimination as women and as non-nationals or stateless persons. 52. Article 9 (2) of the Convention provides that women are to have the same rights as men to acquire, retain or change their nationality, regardless of marriage and divorce and of what their husbands do with their own nationality. Women are also, according to the Convention, to transmit their nationality to their children under the same conditions as their husbands, whether they are in their own country or abroad. 53. Without status as nationals or citizens, 52 stateless women and girls are often marginalized, deprived of the right to vote or stand for public office and may be denied access to public benefits, a choice of residence and free movement, in addition to access to various rights and benefits flowing from status as a national, including rights to education, health care, property or employment. 54. Nationality laws may discriminate directly or indirectly against women. Legislative provisions that appear gender neutral may in practice have a __________________ 50 51 52 14-64766 Executive Committee of the Programme of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, conclusion No. 109 (LXI) on protracted refugee situations. A stateless person is defined under customary international law and in article 1 (1) of the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons as someone who is “not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law”. The International Law Commission has considered the definition in article 1 (1) of the 1954 Convention to form part of customary international law (A/61/10, chap. IV, para. 49). See also UNHCR, Handbook on Protection of Stateless Persons: Under the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons (Geneva, 2014). The terms “nationality” and “citizenship” are used interchangeably. 17/21