The very first piece on this blog that was not the final drafts of the constitution was a discussion of the theory and history behind Edan, That article focused on Edan as a stable, personal, just, non-territorial nation. But it left out a portion of the history of the formation of Edan. That portion was a desire to assist stateless people.
'Refugee' means 'a person outside of their home nation because of persecution, actual or feared'
'Stateless Person' means either 'a person that has no legal recognition of citizenship with any nation (de jure statelessness)' or 'a person outside of their nation of citizenship who cannot avail themselves of the benefits of their nationality for valid reasons such as a state of war, loss of documentation, etc. (de facto statelessness or undocumented statelessness)'.
Not all refugees are stateless and not all stateless people are refugees.
Without citizenship it can be effectively impossible to travel - a stateless person often cannot cross borders, obtain a visa, or (often) apply for asylum. On a day-to-day level they often cannot legally hold a job, gain licences or certifications, get an education, receive health care, etc. Such people commonly cannot register such events and births, marriages, and deaths. In many nations they may be detained at will. In short, by being stateless they both can't live where they are and can't leave where they are.
The UNHCR estimates that there are about 11 million stateless people in the world (equal to the population of Belgium) and a large number of these stateless people are multi-generational families in places like Palestine and the Balkans where stateless parents give birth to stateless children.
One of the goals of the Kingdom is to achieve a level of diplomatic and political recognition as a Non-Territorial Nation that Edan can assist stateless people in finding new citizenship either directly,by offering Edanian citizenship, or indirectly by providing them with the minimum level of identity documentation to allow them to seek asylum/citizenship elsewhere.
King Richard sees this as 'showing love to the foreigner' in a profound way.
The King is well aware that many Edanians are eager to aid persecuted Christians in Iraq and other parts of the world.
So is King Richard. When Edan is capable of helping refugees and the stateless persecuted Christians will be a primary goal for assistance. When Edan was founded in 1999 it was in the face of severe persecution of Christians in Sudan, India, and Chechnya (among many other places). It is well documented bythe International Society for Human Rights (based in Germany), Civitas UK, and many other organizations that 80% of all religious persecution is the persecution of Christians. In 2013, before the attacks in Iraq and the Levant, it was estimated that at least 200 million Christians were being persecuted or outright attacked for their faith. This means that if you were to gather all the world's persecuted and oppressed Christians together it would be the 6th largest nation in the world .
Putanother way, the number of Christians being persecuted in the world right now exceeds the combined populations of the citizens of all religions of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Israel combined.
So what can Edan do?
Right now we can pray and educate. We are not yet at the 'critical mass' needed to gain the economic and political wight needed to do more. As much as we have grown, as much as we have already done, we need to be much larger before we can reach the point of political and diplomatic recognition.
Maybe the most important thing you can do is help Edan grow. Talk to others, use the flyers and handouts we have sent in the past. Pay your taxes. Get Edan to the size where we cannot be ignored. A Media Kit will be issued soon so that you can canvas radio, print, universities, and television stations - King Richard will talk to anyone of good will about Edan.
In a very real way every person, every household that we add to Edan will one day be another stateless family given a new home and another Christian saved from persecution. We can get there, we will get there.
St. Michael Archangel, defend us in battle....
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