10 March 2024
Articles 13 to 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights focus on the freedom of everyone to travel and circulate, both within their own country and abroad. It also affirms the right of people to flee persecution, and the obligation of states to respect this right.
These articles link these issues to that of nationality, which is also a right: states do not have the capacity to render people stateless arbitrarily, nor to prevent a person who so wishes from adopting a nationality other than that of origin.
Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each State. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Everyone has the right to a nationality. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.
The Red Cross is naturally committed to defending Human Rights.
This commitment was reinforced in 2022 with the signing of the national “Business and Human Rights” Pact.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is one of the reference documents of the Code of Conduct and Ethics of the Luxembourg Red Cross.