women are more at risk of being left without property if they cannot register a marriage before a partner dies.149 Previous crisis situations have been accompanied by an increase in girls’ early marriage, linked to school closures, economic insecurity and restrictions in movement (the impact of girls being out of school is addressed in a later section of this publication). Civil registration is important to ensuring that only legal marriages take place and are recognized.150 • Disruptions to birth registration during states of emergency can result in unregistered and “invisible” children being put at heightened risk of violence and human trafficking.151 Birth registration rates are high in the OSCE region. However, even before the COVID-19 pandemic, children in some minority populations were already at risk of being unregistered. For instance, Roma and Sinti faced pre-existing bureaucratic and institutional barriers to accessing birth registration.152 The suspension of birth registries or change to e-registration processes153 under emergency measures may present extra burdens to families and could undo some of the progress made to improve birth registration of Roma and Sinti children, for example. Over the long term, if children are without legal status, they face difficulties accessing education and medical services, and this not only impacts their own development but burdens the women who care for them. Recommended actions to protect women’s rights Shutdowns and the suspension of judicial processes during emergencies should be accompanied by a gender analysis of the risks and obstacles that diverse groups of women will face in accessing justice. The classification of specific legal procedures and civil processes as “non-urgent”/“non-essential” during states of emergency should be non-discriminatory. During emergencies, states should continue to exercise due diligence and give priority to legal measures that protect survivors of violence, allowing them to remain at home while removing perpetrators from the home, to the extent possible. 149 150 151 152 153 “Marriage Vows Not Always Enough in Tajikistan”, Information Warfare Research Project (IWRP) website, 3 February 2009, <https://iwpr.net/global-voices/marriage-vows-not-always-enough-tajikistan>. In the United Kingdom, for example, the General Register Office issued guidance to suspend deathbed marriages/ civil partnerships during the coronavirus pandemic. UN Legal Identity Agenda Task Force, “Maintaining Civil Registration and Vital Statistics During the COVID-19 Pandemic” op. cit., note 160. Ibid. See, e.g.: European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC), “Statelessness, Discrimination and Marginalisation of Roma in the Western Balkans and Ukraine”, October 2017, <https://www.statelessness.eu/resources/ roma-belong-statelessness-discrimination-and-marginalisation>. For example, in Georgia, birth registration can be carried out online, because e-governance systems were in place before the COVID-19 outbreak. In contrast, in the United Kingdom, many local councils paused birth registration, which resulted in backlogs and children being unregistered for weeks after their births. 45