example if it does not recognize them as a citizen. Denaturalization of a person who is abroad usually prevents them from returning to the country. When applied to entire ethnic groups, denaturalization is often used as part of an attempt to encourage people to leave the country. In the past, statelessness was mostly caused by denaturalization. It is disputed whether denaturalization is, in effect, a penal sanction, non-penal national security measure, or something else. Although the majority view is to view denaturalization as punishment, criminologist Milena Tripkovic argues that denaturalization is "a sanction, which seeks to relieve the polity of those members who fail to satisfy fundamental citizenship requirements". De facto denaturalization is effective loss of citizenship in the absence of a formal withdrawal. An example is temporary exclusion orders that some countries issue in order to bar their own nationals from entry, or passport revocation that is used to the same effect. Hundreds of citizens of various European countries, , are stranded in the Middle East because their government refuses to repatriate them in the absence of formal denaturalization. Alternately, some countries have effectively abdicated responsibility for their citizens held in indefinite detention in Guantanamo Bay. In many African countries and elsewhere, including the Dominican Republic and Texas, officials deliberately deny the required documentation to people entitled to citizenship, which can have similar consequences as denaturalization. Other children are not registered at birth for logistical reasons. Targets of denaturalization Denaturalization is often justified on grounds such as: citizenship as a privilege that can be revoked at any time by the government; "those whose actions demonstrate disloyalty forfeit citizenship through those actions; terrorists do not deserve citizenship; citizenship is devalued when undeserving people hold citizenship, and its value is enhanced by stripping it from undeserving citizens". Denaturalization is therefore accompanied by discourse of securitization and the belief that threats to security come from outside of the nation. The targets of denaturalization are presented as foreign even when they were born and raised in the country that stripped their citizenship. In liberal democratic states, denaturalization has always been rare, when compared to the number of naturalizations or even more so the number of citizens. Ethnic minorities The Romanian Jews were denaturalized between 1864 and 1879 during the contested process of Jewish emancipation in Romania, which led to an international outcry and specific protections for Romanian Jews in the 1878 Treaty of