CHAPTER 1 B. ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS OVERVIEW The Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Division (ESCRD) supports SUHAKAM in advising the government to ensure that policies, particularly relating to economic, social, and cultural rights, align with applicable human rights standards. However, the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has, to some extent, affected the implementation of the division’s activities. Some activities were postponed and some were revised to adapt the new norms. For this year, ESCRD intensified its work and advocacy on business and human rights, the follow-up to the National Inquiry into the Land Rights of Indigenous People, statelessness, as well as human rights and poverty. 1. HUMAN RIGHTS AND STATELESSNESS On 11 June, SUHAKAM organised an online dialogue on ‘Human Rights and Statelessness in Malaysia’. More than 70 participants, namely lawyers, academics, CSOs, and interested individuals. The objectives of the dialogue were to explore the concerns of stateless persons in Malaysia. They discussed economic, social, and cultural rights and understanding the challenges and barriers stateless persons face in obtaining nationality in Malaysia. They also shared best practices and challenges in policy development on statelessness, reviewed existing laws and regulations on statelessness and proposed relevant recommendations. Stateless persons face many challenges in fully accessing their fundamental rights to education, healthcare, employment, housing, social security, freedom of movement, political participation, and voting rights that other citizens enjoy despite being born and having lived in the country all their lives. Some are also at high risk of becoming victims of exploitation, arrest and arbitrary detention and deportation. SUHAKAM observed that among the reasons for statelessness in Malaysia was a lack of knowledge of the importance of legal documents, lack of access to registration services, inconsistent administrative or procedural issues in obtaining the documents, non-registration of the parents’ marriages, no proof of birth or abandonment of the child without identification documents and information about their background, and gaps in nationality laws. Participants also raised concerns on the discriminatory provisions in the Federal Constitution concerning nationality, that Malaysian women ANNUAL REPORT 2020 29