Nationality on Hold (NoH)

Hadi Sajjadi

Nationality on Hold (NoH) is an independent initiative working to document, understand, and address statelessness in Iran and Afghanistan. Founded and led by individuals with lived experience of statelessness, NoH envisions a region where no child grows up an outsider, no woman is denied the right to pass on her nationality, and no community is deprived of basic rights because of ethnicity, gender, or religion.

Our mission over the next three years is to build the first comprehensive regional database on statelessness, publish a Handbook on Statelessness in Iran and Afghanistan, develop plain-language legal guides on nationality rights, and lead participatory forums and advocacy campaigns addressing two critical areas:

1: Gender discrimination in nationality law—advocating for the full implementation of Iran’s 2019 citizenship reform.
2: Statelessness caused by extended refugeehood—highlighting the intergenerational exclusion of Afghan refugees born and raised in Iran.

NoH’s work combines research, technology, and community participation through three main initiatives:
1) AI Legal Assistant: an experimental tool that provides plain-language answers to legal questions based on official laws, legal research, and community-generated data. A two-day pilot test received 7,000 user queries, revealing the urgent demand for accessible legal information.
2) Community Legal Resources: in collaboration with local law firms in Iran and Afghanistan, NoH produces practical guides that empower affected persons to navigate nationality, birth registration, and documentation procedures.
3) Artistic Engagement: NoH partners with local artists and filmmakers to bring visibility to statelessness and its human dimensions within underrepresented cultural spaces.

As a three-year grantee partner of the Global Statelessness Fund, NoH is committed to advancing evidence-based advocacy, cross-border collaboration, and technology-driven empowerment for stateless and at-risk populations in Iran, Afghanistan, and the wider region.