It is easy to underestimate the Kyrgyz citizen registration system, a remnant of the Soviet Union created to control population movement. Being a registered citizen of any location back then would give you a host of benefits in tow: a right to education, social security and medical treatment. However in modern times, with thousands migrating to cities in search of a better life, the system of registration still exists but has become a hindrance rather than a help, blocking access to vital services.

This is why the Kyrgyz Red Crescent, supported by the British Red Cross and working in partnership with other local NGOs and institutions, is advocating for the abolition of this system that causes unimaginable damage and makes citizens feel like intruders in their own country. Women are particularly badly affected by this system.

Why is that? Take Gulmira, 39 and her five children. Gulmira migrated to the capital, Bishkek, from a village high in the Kyrgyz Tian Shan mountains that separate the Central Asian nation from neighbouring China. She settled in the poorly serviced newly created migrant village of Nijnyaya Ala-Archa on the fringes of the city. She pays more than half of her small salary that she earns as a cleaner on accommodation: a small room the size of the average English kitchen where she sleeps on the cold floor - cold even in September - with her five children.

One year ago, she was about to give birth to her son. 'I had to deliver my baby in this room,' she tells me, 'because when we asked for healthcare no one would come. They told me that as I am not a registered citizen of Bishkek, I would have to pay. I can barely afford to feed my children so I had no option. My neighbour helped me, and my baby was born on this floor. I was scared, but there was no alternative.'

Gulmira was lucky, because many women and their children die every year because they can not afford to access healthcare. 'All winter we were sick with colds and with the flu. In desperation I went to the hospital one day, but they would not help me because I am not registered. We rely on the goodwill of our neighbours to survive.'

Gulmira has taken part in a Red Crescent training programme to learn about her rights as a migrant and to help gain access to employment. As a result she has found work with a private cleaning company in a department store. Financially she is able to keep the family afloat - barely - although there is nothing left over to pay expensive fees because she is lacking a registration stamp in her passport.

She also learnt first aid from the Red Crescent, extremely important in the area she lives in with no medical facilities. It is clear how her family is suffering: her baby has never been to a doctor in his life, two of her children, 13 and 4, do not even speak, and they are clearly malnourished.

According to Emil Nasretdinov, an expert on migration issues at the Centre of Social Research of the American University of Central Asia, the issue of internal migration in Kyrgyzstan is vastly underestimated. Approximately 220,000 internal migrants live on the outskirts of Bishkek and only 0.05% of these are registered. That means that one quarter of the population of the city is not officially recognised as citizens. The main problems arising from this are lack of employment and healthcare, but also suffering at the hands of the police and some city residents who do not appreciate that migrants fill many of the jobs that other residents are not willing to take on.

Professor Nasretdinov is working with the Red Crescent to propose both long term and short term solutions to this issue. In the long term, he believes the 'propiska' registration system should be replaced by a national ID database that would allow citizens to access benefits wherever they are resident.

Recognising that this is bound to take time, he is also working with the Red Crescent to look to provide a shorter term solution of extending temporary residency permits that migrants can apply for to not only give them permission to live in a new location, but also all of the benefits that they are not currently allowed to access.

Jamilya Shayahmetova, head of the Kyrgyz Red Crescent Health and Social Care department says, 'While we are carrying out our work to relieve temporary problems of migrants by teaching them life skills, health skills and vocational training, we recognize the need for advocacy around these issues to change the way the system works.'

It is by tackling this problem from an institutional and grassroots level simultaneously that the Red Crescent and their partners will be able to make a real difference to the lives of Gulmira, her family, and the hundreds of thousands of internal migrants in Kyrgyzstan.

Professor Nasretdinov is hopeful that if the system can be changed, then it could be exported to other post-Soviet states with similar problems. 'Kyrgyzstan is a bit like a development lab' he says. 'We hope that by growing expertise and showing that we can find an alternative system here, we can then export this elsewhere. This is out hope for the future.'

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