E/CN.4/Sub.2/AC.5/2001/2 page 11 50. Citizenship remains an important condition for full and effective participation. Barriers to the acquisition of citizenship for members of minorities should be reduced. Forms of participation by resident non-citizens should also be developed, including local voting rights after a certain period of residence and inclusion of elected non-citizen observers in municipal, regional and national legislative and decision-making assemblies. 2.4 Persons belonging to minorities have the right to establish and maintain their own associations 51. Persons belonging to minorities are entitled, in the same way as other members of society, to set up any association they may want,11 including educational or religious institutions, but their right to association is not limited to concerns related to their cultural, linguistic or religious identity. The right to associate of persons belonging to minorities extends both to national and to international associations. Their right to form or join associations can be limited only by law and the limitations can only be those which apply to associations of majorities: limitations must be those necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public safety, public order, the protection of public health or morals, or the protection of rights and freedoms. 2.5 Persons belonging to minorities have the right to establish and maintain, without any discrimination, free and peaceful contacts with other members of their group and with persons belonging to other minorities, as well as contacts across frontiers with citizens of other States to whom they are related by national or ethnic, religious or linguistic ties 52. The right to contacts has three facets, permitting intra-minority contacts, inter-minority contacts, and transfrontier contacts. The right to intra-minority contacts is inherent in the right of association. Inter-minority contacts make it possible for persons belonging to minorities to share experience and information and to develop a common minority platform within the State. The right to transfrontier contacts constitutes the major innovation of the Declaration, and serves in part to overcome some of the negative consequences of the often unavoidable division of ethnic groups by international frontiers. Such contacts must be “free” but also “peaceful”. The latter limitation has two aspects: it must not involve the use of violent means or preparation of the use of such means; secondly, the aims must be in conformity with the Declaration and generally with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, as set out also in article 8.4 of the Declaration. Article 3 3.1 Persons belonging to minorities may exercise their rights, including those set forth in the present Declaration, individually as well as in community with other members of their group, without any discrimination 53. The main point here is that persons can exercise their rights both individually and collectively, the most important aspect being the collective exercise of their rights, be it through associations, cultural manifestations or educational institutions, or in any other way. That they