available limitations on human rights for reasons of national security. These could also be consulted by those OSCE states that are not party to the ECHR. The Court has stipulated certain criteria that legislation should meet: these are referred to in Box 7.7 below as the “quality of law” test. They include the need for laws to be foreseeable, that they should restrain the discretion of those to whom they confer powers, and that safeguards should be created to guard against the abuse of such powers. 56 57 58 59 60 Box 7.7 The European Convention ‘Quality of Law’ Test56 The Convention prescribes that limitations have to be made “in accordance with the law”. The case law of the European Court of Human Rights has said, inter alia: • Laws include common-law rules, as well as statutes and subordinate legislation. In this case, the Court has stated that to qualify as “law”, a norm must be adequately accessible and formulated with sufficient precision to enable citizens to regulate their conduct;57 • A law that “allows the exercise of unrestrained discretion in individual cases will not possess the essential characteristics of foreseeability and thus will not be a law for present purposes. The scope of the discretion must be indicated with reasonable certainty”,58 and safeguards must exist against abuse of the discretion established by law;59 • As far as these safeguards are not written in the law itself, the law must at least establish the conditions and procedures for interference.60 56  European Court of Human Rights’ website: <http://www.echr.coe.int>; Ian Cameron, National Security and the European Convention on Human Rights (Dordrecht/Uppsala: Kluwer Law International, 2000). 57  Sunday Times v. United Kingdom, European Court of Human Rights, 26 April 1979, European Human Rights Reports, Vol. 2, 1979, p. 45, para. 47. 58  Silver and Others v. United Kingdom, European Court of Human Rights, 25 March 1983, European Human Rights Reports, Vol. 5, 1983, p. 347, para. 85. 59  Ibid., paras. 88-89. 60  Klass v. Federal Republic of Germany, European Court of Human Rights, 9 March 1977, European Human Rights Reports, Vol. 2, 1979, p. 214, para. 63; Kruslin v. France, European Court of Human Rights, 24 April 1990, European Human Rights Reports, Vol. 12, 1990, p. 547, para. 35; Huvig v. France, European Court of Human Rights, 24 April 1990, European Human Rights Reports, 1990, Vol. 12, p. 528, para. 34. 53 Handbook on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of Armed Forces Personnel