A/HRC/58/54 52. Therefore, the right of States to identity stems from the combination of the exercise of the right to self-determination and the principle of sovereignty. 44 The right to self-determination is recognized and guaranteed by the Charter of the United Nations (Article 1 (2)) and by article 1 (1) of both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which reads: “All peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” The right to determine freely the form and goals of the State is the bedrock of States’ specificities, or in other terms, their national identity. 45 The principle of sovereignty, embedded in Article 2 (1) of the Charter of the United Nations, allows a State to maintain its national identity as a structural component of its status as a State under international law, without any possible interference from other subjects of international law, as guaranteed by the principle of non-intervention embedded in Article 2 (7) of the Charter. Therefore, the right to identity as it concerns States is not recognized or even guaranteed as such by international law, but is consubstantial with the very nature of the State as an emanation of self-determination of a people, materialized and protected by the sovereign nature of the State. 53. As the existence of a State’s right to identity is a sovereign right of the State, each State may voluntarily limit such right by international commitments. As the Permanent Court of International Justice underlined in a 1923 ruling: “The abandonment of the rights in question cannot be regarded as inadmissible for reasons connected with Germany’s sovereignty; […] on the contrary, the right of entering into international engagements is an attribute of State sovereignty.”46 The right to identity being a sovereign right of each State, by adopting the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities and agreeing to “protect the existence and the national or ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic identity of minorities within their respective territories” (art. 1), States sovereignly accepted that their own national identity was not a matter of exclusive sovereignty, but should be constructed in such a way as to protect the existence and identity of minority groups within their respective territories (see para. 64 below). 2. The right to individual identity 54. All human beings do have an identity, even though a specific right to individual identity is not recognized in human rights law in general, with the noticeable exception of article 8 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Article 8 of the Convention reads: “States Parties undertake to respect the right of the child to preserve his or her identity, including nationality, name and family relations as recognized by law without unlawful interference.” Interestingly, this right to identity is distinct from the right to have a legal personality, which is embedded in article 7 of the Convention.47 Let us underline that this right to identity in article 8 is worded in negative terms: it has to be respected by the State, it is not assigned by the State. The right thus exists without State intervention, implying that child identity derives from self-identification or relational identity (the latter being most likely for young children, through the family or the community, as a newborn child may not be able to immediately materialize and formulate his or her self-identity), not from assigned 44 45 46 47 GE.25-00509 James J. Summers, “The right of self-determination and nationalism in international law”, International Journal on Minority and Group Rights, vol. 12, No. 4 (December 2005), pp. 325–354. On this consequence of the right to self-determination, see Martti Koskenniemi, “National self-determination today: problems of legal theory and practice”, International and Comparative Law Quarterly, vol. 43, No. 2 (1994), pp. 241–269. Permanent Court of International Justice, S.S. Wimbledon, Judgment, 17 August 1923 (Series A, No. 1), in Annual Report of the Permanent Court of International Justice (1 January 1922–15 June 1925), Series E, No. 1, p. 165. Article 7 (1) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child reads: “The child shall be registered immediately after birth and shall have the right from birth to a name, the right to acquire a nationality and, as far as possible, the right to know and be cared for by his or her parents.” See Stefanie Schmahl, ed., The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child: Article-by-Article Commentary (London, Nomos/Hart, 2021). 11