Michaelmas 2021 The Law of Treaties Dr Andrew Sanger, Corpus Christi College 1. What are these lectures about? These lectures will examine the law on treaties, including the making of treaties, the circumstances in which states are permitted to make reservations to multilateral treaties (and the consequences thereof), how treaties are interpreted (briefly), the circumstances in which they are considered invalid and the rules for treaty termination, suspension, and withdrawal. Further General Reading: J Crawford, 'The Current Political Discourse Concerning International Law' (2018) 81 The Modern Law Review 1-22 (especially 6-7, 10-18); H Charlesworth and C Chinkin, The Boundaries of International Law: A Feminist Analysis (2000) Ch 4; Fitzmaurice, 'The Practical Working of the Law of Treaties', in Evans (ed) International Law (2018) Ch 6; A Aust, Modern Treaty Law and Practice (2013) Ch 1. 2. What is a treaty? 2.1 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969 1155 UNTS 331 · VCLT provides the 'default rules'. · Contractual character - but remember Arts 53 and 64 VCLT (jus cogens) · Requirement of registration of treaties with the UN Secretariat. Article 102 UN Charter: 'Every treaty and every international agreement entered into by any Member of the United Nations ... shall as soon as possible be registered with the Secretariat and published by it.' Creates a public record and helps understand state relations. It also discourages states making secret treaties. · VCLT does not have universal membership, but many provisions are customary law (recall the last set of lectures on the relationship between customary international law and treaties). See, eg, Gab?Ãkovo-Nagymaros Project (Hungary/Slovakia), ICJ Reports 1997, para 46: '[the Court] has several times had occasion to hold that some of the rules laid down in [the VCLT] might be considered as a codification of existing customary law. The Court takes the view that in many respects this applies to the provisions of the Vienna Convention concerning the termination and the suspension of the operation of treaties, set forth in Articles 60 to 62'. · Flexibility and generality is given a common base line but allows variation. ] · VCLT does not apply to genocide as it is not retrospective. · States can accede by accession, deciding to join later, signing or by succession- emerging as new state. Page 1 of 22
Michaelmas 2021 2.2 Definition of a treaty Art 2(1)(a) VCLT: 'For the purposes of the present convention: (A) 'Treaty' means an international agreement concluded between States in written form and governed by international law, whether embodied in a single instrument or in two or more related instruments and whatever its particular designation'. VCLT does not apply to oral treaties or treaties with international organisations (art 3). There must be an intention to create legal relations (if not, might be 'soft law'). Look at the language ti determine wither it decides to create legal relations. Aegean Sea Continental Shelf (Greece v. Turkey), ICJ Rep 1978, p. 4tttt, para 96: 'On the