Protection and identification of stateless persons through EU law

A number of recent studies confirm that statelessness is a widespread phenomenon in the EU, which is not receiving adequate attention. The lack of well-functioning statelessness determination procedures is at the root of many problems associated with statelessness in the EU. These are, in particular, the inadequate protection of stateless persons and deficiencies in the prevention and reduction of statelessness. This paper argues in favour of common EU action on the identification and protection of stateless persons by analyzing the EU competence to pass relevant legislation, and explaining the desirability for such legislation.