Ebook: Peace through International Law: The Role of the International Law Commission. A Colloquium at the Occasion of its Sixtieth Anniversary
- Tags: European Law/Public International Law
- Series: Beiträge zum ausländischen öffentlichen Recht und Völkerrecht 211
- Year: 2009
- Publisher: Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
- Edition: 1
- Language: English
- pdf
Georg Nolte Excellencies, dear Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, I welcome you to our colloquium on the occasion of the sixtieth an- versary of the International Law Commission. The Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich and the Humboldt University of Berlin are happy that you have followed our invitation. We are particularly proud that a majority of the members of the Int- national Law Commission have accepted our invitation. The presence of one former member of the Commission deserves special mention: Bruno Simma is now not only a Judge at the International Court of J- tice but also, if I may say so, the “local hero”, having held the wond- ful Chair for International Law at the University of Munich for more than thirty years. He is still living in Munich when he is not in The Hague. We are glad that participants have come from nearby, from neighbouring regions and countries, as well as from countries as far away as Brazil and China. I am personally very content that our group represents a fine mixture of experienced international lawyers and younger colleagues and students. This composition gives us the opp- tunity for fruitful exchanges, and for the ILC to reach out and to - ceive feedback. The International Law Commission needs no introduction. Like a few happy persons, at age sixty it can look back onto a largely successful - reer.
While peace is the overarching goal of the United Nations, questions of war and peace are not always directly considered in the day-to-day work of the International Law Commission (ILC). The sixtieth anniversary of the ILC provides an occasion to reflect on the role and the responsibility, but also on the limits, of the ILC in the area of peace and security. Three areas of the Commission’s work will be assessed: the law of State responsibility and the law of treaties as "classics" among the topics treated by the ILC. In addition, the topic of shared natural resources is likely to have an increasing importance for peace and security in the future.
While peace is the overarching goal of the United Nations, questions of war and peace are not always directly considered in the day-to-day work of the International Law Commission (ILC). The sixtieth anniversary of the ILC provides an occasion to reflect on the role and the responsibility, but also on the limits, of the ILC in the area of peace and security.
Three areas of the Commission’s work will be assessed: the law of State responsibility and the law of treaties as "classics" among the topics treated by the ILC. In addition, the topic of shared natural resources is likely to have an increasing importance for peace and security in the future.