Convention’s requirement that states facilitate naturalization of refugees (article 34). 53 It arguably does exactly that — it reduces barriers, such as wait times and other conditions, in order to make it easier for specified persons to acquire citizenship. 38. However, article 3 of the Refugee Convention states ‘[t]he Contracting States shall apply the provisions of this Convention to refugees without discrimination as to race, religion or country of origin.’54 Article 3 is one of few provisions in the Refugee Convention in relation to which states are prohibited from entering reservations, 55 indicating the importance of non-discrimination to the refugee regime. Hence the CAA is inconsistent with basic principles of refugee law, further undermining the purported legitimate objective. 39. Moreover, the government invokes by way of justification other concepts that are foreign to both refugee law and international legal principle. For example, the counter affidavit states, in defending the CAA’s protection of persons from some religions but not others, that, ‘intra-religious persecutions or sectarian persecution or persecution due to nonrecognition of particular sects to be within the fold of majority religion in the said countries, cannot be equated with the persecution of religious minorities admittedly following and practicing a different and completely distinct religion than the majority religion in particular neighbouring countries.’ 56 There is no authority in international law for such distinctions; on the contrary the ICCPR (to which India is a party with no relevant reservations) provides that ‘Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion’, 57 and it is clear that such freedom is not confined only to some religions or dependent on minority status. 58 Nor is there any authority in refugee law for protecting only some types of religious persecution but not others. 59 40. Finally, even if protection against persecution could properly be said to constitute a legitimate end in relation to the CAA, there is a question whether the measure adopted here, namely, to protect some groups but not others, could be considered proportionate to the achievement of that objective? We submit that this measure is both overly broad in that it does not only protect those fearing persecution, as discussed above, and is under-protective in that it leaves out very significant populations who may fear persecution (for example, persons of Muslim faith in the named countries such as the Hazaras from Afghanistan, Ahmadis from Pakistan, Hazaras and Shi’a from Afghanistan, and Ahmadis and Shi’a from Pakistan. Baha'i or Shia from other neighbouring countries). 60 The government has 53 Refugee Convention (n 15) art 34: ‘The Contracting States shall as far as possible facilitate the assimilation and naturalization of refugees. They shall in particular make every effort to expedite naturalization proceedings and to reduce as far as possible the charges and costs of such proceedings.’ 54 Ibid art 3 (emphasis added). 55 Ibid art 42(1). 56 Counter affidavit (n 23) at [34]. 57 ICCPR (n 8) art 18(1). 58 Human Rights Committee, General Comment 22: Article 18 (Freedom of Thought, Conscience or Religion) UN Doc CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.4 (30 July 1993) [1] – [2]. 59 UNHCR, Guidelines on International Protection: Religion-Based Refugee Claims under Article 1A(2) of the 1951 Convention and/or the 1967 Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees, HCR/GIP/04/06 (28 April 2004). 60 Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘Application for Intervention’ (n 18) [33]. 12