About a billion people globally don’t have a legal identity, according to the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Key points
- A Legal Identity and Rights-Based Return Management Conference was organised by IOM at the UN City in Copenhagen, Denmark on October 30-31, 2023 to promote dialogue between countries of origin and destination for such people without legal identities.
- The billion people who lack legal identities are invisible to states, limiting their access to services and restricting their mobility, forcing them to travel longer, more dangerous and irregular routes.
- The conference convened government officials from countries of origin and destination and served to promote cross-regional exchanges on legal identity as a core enabler of safer and regular migration, including enhanced readmission capacities, and socio-economic development through international cooperation and partnerships on border governance.
- The initiative was organized within the framework of IOM’s Global Programme Enhancing Readmission and Legal Identity Capacities (RELICA), launched in 2022.
- The RELICA Global Programme uses an evidence-based approach to working with selected countries on structural gaps and technical capacities on readmission and legal identity, to enhance efficient migration management, including countering irregular migration, mitigating border security-related concerns, and facilitating rights’-based return processes.
- These objectives are also reflected in IOM´s participation in the UN Legal identity Agenda Task Force and in the recent release of IOM´s Institutional Strategy on Legal Identity.
