United Stateless founding member Karina Ambartsoumian-Clough wrote a powerful, moving, and informative op-ed about developments around the recent United States Supreme Court decision regarding Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and how uncertain the future still is for stateless people living in the country.

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The 2019 Migration Working Group Symposium elevated the conversation of statelessness in policy and legal discourse. The Symposium incorporated diverse perspectives that span race, region, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and ability to discuss contemporary issues related to Statelessness. 

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In October 2019, members and allies of United Stateless organized its fall convening. We invited people who work on the issue of statelessness or work more generally on refugee and immigrant rights. This gathering was an opportunity to learn more about statelessness, what it means to be a stateless person living in the U.S., and how being stateless impacts our lives.

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In June 2019, allies of United Stateless attended the World Conference on Statelessness in the Hague, organized by the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion and the CANCELLED Arts Programme. Unfortunately, no members of United Stateless were able to attend, due to travel restrictions stemming from their statelessness.

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We held our 4th planning retreat to set our goals and priorities for the coming year. As always, our time together was also was a chance to reflect, rejuvenate, and support one another as stateless people and allies.

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Founding members of United Stateless Ekaterina and Karina Ambartsoumian-Clough participated in Beyond Representation: Migration Symposium at SIPA, Columbia University.

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Founding members of United Stateless, Ekaterina and Nikolai, participated in Radio Philadelphia’s show “Evening with Dr. Borisovich” on 106.5 FM. During this one hour program we addressed the Pennsylvania Russian speaking community regarding statelessness issues in the U.S. we received great feedback and several calls from listeners. One caller shared his family member’s in limbo story. You can playback the show here. This event is a very important step of our project focused on reaching out to media resources in communities affected by statelessness.

​Three founding members of United Stateless — Nikolai Levasov, Danah Abdulaziz, and Ekaterina — participated as guest speakers and panelists in a workshop organized by The Americas Network on Nationality and Statelessness (Red ANA), Open Society Justice Initiative, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Event keynote speakers included Volker Türk (UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Protection) and Eric Schwartz (Refugees International, President).​

A founding member of United Stateless and Rohingya activist, Dr Abdul Hamid, participated as a guest speaker in a panel event along with Dr. Fernand de Varennes (UN Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues) and Amal de Chickera (Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion).

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A founding member of United Stateless, Danah K. Abdulaziz, was invited to speak at a panel event targeting academic audiences.

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On October 9, 2018, our founding member Karina Ambartsaumian-Clough spoke at the Center for Migration Studies Annual Academic and Policy Symposium. View Karina's presentation here.

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Members of United Stateless and allies gathered for the third time at the UNHCR conference room in Washington DC for a special planning retreat. There is something truly special taking place. A synergy, a focused movement forward, and a new kind of clarity of purpose. Our group is slowly growing in numbers, each person's story offering unique perspective and new questions to explore.

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Two members of United Stateless Steering Committee met with the New York City Mayor's Office to discuss Municipal ID accessibility to the stateless population.

Two members of United Stateless were invited to Columbia University’s School of International Affairs as guest speakers. During the lecture we shared our personal stories and organizational goals for this year. Graduate students and Adjunct Professor Betsy Apple expressed genuine concern in the U.S. statelessness situation.

Representatives of United Stateless attended an informal NGO consultation with Ms. Tendayi Achiume, Special rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. The meeting was attended by a number of non-profit organizations working on the topic of race and xenophobia in the U.S. Discrimination based on nationality and against immigrant communities forms a large part of her mandate.

United Stateless members and several allies including the facilitators from UNHCR, and The Americas Network on Nationality and Statelessness gathered in Washington D.C. once again to further develop our goals, objectives, and engage in team building. Retreat goals included gaining deeper understanding of policy issues and advocacy strategies. 

On February 4th, 2018 Nikolai met with Ayub Khan, the organizer of the Burmese Rohingya Community of Georgia. During their two hour conversation they discussed many issues including the high number of stateless people in the Rohingya community, language barriers and other difficulties in accessing U.S. citizenship, and the current situation with Rohingya in Burma, Bangladesh and other countries.

A member of United Stateless, Nikolai, met with the leaders of the Eritrean-American Community Association of Georgia. They discussed the importance of identifying stateless individuals and participating in activities that would help end statelessness in the United States. We received substantial evidence that the issue of statelessness exists within the Eritrean Community. Our organization was invited to participate in their Annual Community Day at the end of April where we will be able to share information on statelessness with all guests and meet stateless people.

A representative of our group attended an interactive dialogue with the SRSG Ms. Louise Arbour, who presented the Secretary-General's report "Making Migration Work for All". Our representative provided commentary regarding the situation with stateless people within the state members’ territory, including the United States. Additionally, we raised concerns regarding the limited visibility of the statelessness issue in the current Secretary-General's report "Making Migration Work for All” and requested a better focus on our problems. We are planning to participate in more upcoming UN events.

A representative of United Stateless visited PODCAST MIXTAPE: UNSETTLED Local Stories from the Global Refugee Crisis on Monday, where he made contacts with journalist who agreed to cover the stateless situation in the United States. After the event discussions took place with guests: Jana Mason, senior adviser for external relations and government affairs of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and Hans Van de Weerd, vice president of U.S. Programs at the International Rescue Committee. Our group wants to thank George Tarr, the New York delegate from Refugee Congress for assisting and coordinating.

The UNHCR office in Washington DC hosted National Media Training for the Refugee Congress. Two members of our organization, Karina and Nikolai, were invited to participate in this training. They learned about the importance of identifying an audience, making stories more narrative, building message formulas and much more! The event included a training interview on camera and other activities.

UNHCR hosted a convening of Stateless Persons at their Regional Office in Washington DC. Seven stateless persons were present, as well as a facilitator from UNHCR, two protection officers, as well as a representative from Refugee Congress. The meeting opened with the overview of statelessness in the US and UNHCR's Global and National Action Plans to End Statelessness by 2024, and steps that are being taken. Benefits and challenges of creating a Stateless Persons Network/Organization were identified. Organizational structure was discussed, agreement reached to work towards a 501 (c3) non-profit.

Representatives of United Stateless traveled to D.C. to attend an expert meeting with UNHCR and the Center for Migration Studies on Mapping Statelessness in the US. Read the agenda here.

The Douglas Global Summit was our first conference participation. We did not attend the event as presenters. Nonetheless it was a great experience on how to create top-level presentations.  Any conference is a great place to establish good contacts with the leaders of organizations who work on domestic and international human rights issues. The contact we made during this summit may lead to great results.  Statelessness in America might finally become the top priority problem for one of the most powerful domestic human rights organizations.