passport
Would a passport containing no sex category be internationally recognised?
<p>Assume that a country removes the <em>sex</em> category from its legal system and thus also from its passports. Just like the <em>hair color</em> or <em>foot size</em> are no legal category.
Would this cause problems for its citizens to travel internationally?</p>
<p>I found that the 'International Civil Aviation Organization' standardising machine-readable passports includes the category <em>sex</em> in its formats (see <a href="https://www.icao.int/publications/Documents/9303_p3_cons_en.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.icao.int/publications/Documents/9303_p3_cons_en.pdf</a>). But would it cause problems if this category is not present on the passports of this country? Or could this circumvented by assigning the <em>sex</em> 'X' to all citizens?</p>

<h2>The recognition of other country’s passports is a courtesy</h2>
<p>Each nation is sovereign over its own borders. So who they allow in (and out) is a matter for them. For example, many Arab countries will ban your entry if you have an Israeli stamp in your passport no matter what nationality it is.</p>
<p>So, yes, any country can decide not to record sex in a passport and, yes, there may be consequences in other nations.</p>

<p><a href="https://www.icao.int/publications/Documents/9303_p4_cons_en.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">ICAO 9303 Part 4</a> specifies that sex is a mandatory data element, and that it may have one of three values: F, M, or X.  Therefore, if the country wants its passports to comply, the answers to your questions are</p>
<blockquote>
<p>But would it cause problems if this category is not present on the passports of this country?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Probably.  Other countries could decide to accept passports that comply with ICAO standards in every other respect, but universal acceptance is probably unlikely.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Or could this circumvented by assigning the sex 'X' to all citizens?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>X is used to denote &quot;unspecified,&quot; so this would comply with the standard.  Whether every country in the world would accept it is another matter.</p>
