UN Law Congress explores new 'international language.'

UN Chronicle, June, 1995

International law is more than a set of rules for States, it is a "language of communication", Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali declared on 17 March in addressing the United Nations Congress on Public International Law (13-17 March, New York).

Today, however, some principles which in the past were the foundation for international society, had become "outdated or obsolete", he said. That was a result of the sudden acceleration in the pace of change and the new context affecting relations between States after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the end of the bloc politics and the emergence of new Powers.

"We must therefore, and as a maker of urgency. rethink the ruses of our collective future and attempt to instil, if not a moral code. at least a minimum of legal rationality into the behaviour of the key social factors", the Secretary-General stated.

First of a kind in UN history,the Congress was held within the framework of the UN Decade of International Law (1990-1999). in order to "promote the role of law in international relations", as Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and UN Legal Counsel Hans Corell put it on 13 March in an opening statement.

The multinational event--convened pursuant to General Assembly resolutions 48/30 and 49/50, in the year of the UN's fiftieth anniversary under the general theme "Towards the twenty-first century: International law as a language for international relations"--brought together some 650 participants from 140 countries: practicing lawyers. parliamentarians, corporate counsel, government officials, judges, arbitrators, teachers of law, diplomats and members of academia.

Among topics considered were: the promotion and implementation of the principles of international law; means of peaceful settlement of disputes between States, including resort to and full respect for the International Court of Justice; new developments and priorities relative to codification and progressive development of international law; approaches to research, education and training in international law; and new challenges and expectations towards the twenty-first century.

Round-table discussions included: UN sanctions as a tool of peaceful settlement of disputes; fact-finding commissions; the role of the Security Council and the World Court in a changing world; State sovereignty; international humanitarian law; legal aspects of sustainable development; space law; environmental law challenges to the Law of the Sea Convention; and the "physiognomy of disputes and the appropriate means to resolve them".

In his address to the Congress, the Secretary-General said that with a resurgence in the activities of the Security Council and because the UN had "neither the technical nor the financial resources to conduct large-scale military operations", the Council might consider to delegate such operations to either a coalition of Member States or a regional organization.

The World Court, by resolving the legal disputes between States, could play a decisive role in the political settlement of the underlying conflict, he suggested. Also, he said, the recent establishment of tribunals to try those allegedly responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law, like in the case of the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, was a "significant advance for law itself".

Under-Secretary-General Corell hoped that the Congress would become a "resounding appeal to these who ultimately make the decisions that affect our destiny", and called upon them to ensure that "legal advice is sought before important decisions are made in foreign policy matters". Altogether, he said, their responsibilities could be "translated into one single word: statesmanship!". If the world community was to meet the UN Charter's goal of saving future generations from the scourge of war, "arms must cede to the law and, ultimately, to the judge's robe", he declared.

Judge Mohammed Bedjaoui, World Court President, said that access to the Court's advisory opinions, which were an "instrument for preventive diplomacy" and a "barrier to potential abuse" that served to prevent conflict and deflate tensions, should be extended to more organizations and States. However, regional organizations. which, in some cases, were engaged in joint responsibilities with the UN, were excluded from the present definition of the Court's advisory function, he noted.