2021] NATIONALITY LAWS 143 differentiation, judged in the light of the objectives and purposes of the Convention, are not applied pursuant to a legitimate aim, and are not proportional to the achievement of this aim.”263 Following the reasoning of the European Court of Human Rights, this may be referred to as justified distinctions.264 In the Belgian Linguistic case, the Court articulates the following twolimbed test for determining the difference between justified and unjustified distinctions: [T]he Court, following the principles which may be extracted from the legal practice of a large number of democratic states, holds that the principle of equality of treatment is violated if the distinction has no objective and reasonable justification. The existence of such a justification must be assessed in relation to the aim and effects of the measure under consideration, regard being had to the principles which normally prevail in democratic societies.265 The Court goes on to contend, with reference to Article 14 of the European Convention of Human Rights, that the prohibition on discrimination is violated “when it is clearly established that 263 Comm. on Elimination Racial Discrimination, Concluding Observations on Denmark, ¶ 19, U.N. Doc. CERD/C/DEN/CO/17 (Oct. 19, 2006). See General Recommendation Thirty-Two, supra note 36, ¶ 8 (“On the core notion of discrimination, general recommendation No. 30 (2004) of the Committee observed that differential treatment will ‘constitute discrimination if the criteria for such differentiation, judged in the light of the objectives and purposes of the Convention, are not applied pursuant to a legitimate aim, and are not proportional to the achievement of this aim.’”). See also U.N. GAOR, 48th Sess., Supplement No. 18 at 115, U.N. Doc. A/48/18 (Sept. 15, 1993) (observing that “differential treatment will not constitute discrimination if the criteria for such differentiation, judged against the objectives and purposes of the Convention, are ‘legitimate’”). 264 See DANIEL MOECKLI ET AL., INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS LAW (2010). 265 In re Laws on the Use of Languages in Education in Belgium v. Belgium, App. No. 1474/62, at 31 (Feb. 9, 1967), http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001-57524 [https://perma.cc/5GHE-3ZRY] [hereinafter Belgian Linguistic Case]. See also Comm. on Elimination Racial Discrimination, Concluding Observations on Australia, ¶ 24, U.N. Doc. CERD/C/AUS/CO/14 (Apr. 15, 2005) (recommending that Australia “review its policies, taking into consideration the fact that, under the Convention, differential treatment based on citizenship or immigration status would constitute discrimination if the criteria for such differentiation, judged in the light of the objectives and purposes of the Convention, are not applied pursuant to a legitimate aim, and are not proportional to the achievement of that aim.”).