The applicant was born in Azerbaijan to an Armenian father and an Azeri mother, and subsequently lived in Russia and Belarus before arriving in France. His stateless status application was rejected as he did not demonstrate having made repeated and diligent attempts at getting recognised as a national by Russia, Armenia or Azerbaijan. The Court upheld the administrative decision.
The applicant was born in 1961 in Kirovabad (Azerbaijan) to a an Armenian father and an Azeri mother. He lived in Moscow between 1988 and 1995, and in Orcha (Belarus) from 1995 to 2005. He arrived in France in 2005 and unsuccessfully applied for asylum. His statelessness status application was rejected in 2015.
The applicant argued that he is not able to rely either Russian, Belarusian law, or Armenian law to be recognised as one of the nationals of any of those countries, and that consequently the statelessness status must be granted to him.
The Court reasoned as follows:
"4. Considering that the applicant, on whom lies the burden of proof to establish that he has unsuccessfully attempted to get recognised as a national by the countries of his birth and residence, neither shows that he has made repeated and diligent efforts to be recognised as an Azerbaijani, an Armenian or a Russian national, nor that these countries have rejected such requests from him; that, moreover, his initial allegations that he left Azerbaijan for Russia in 1993 and not in 1988, so that the provisions of article 13 of Russian law Nr. 1948-1 of 28 November 1991 On Nationality of Russian Federation, amended in 1992 do not apply to him, are substantively contradicted by his statements during an interview conducted in Russian on February 20, 2014 in the context of the statelessness determination procedure"
The Court upheld the administrative decision refusing to grant the applicant a statelessness status.