Fifth Report on State Responsibility
Abstract
This Report deals with two topics. One is the proposals and the suggestions relating to the implementation of part 3 of the project as envisaged at the outset. As envisaged at that time, Part 3 was to deal with amicable settlement procedures to be resorted to by States in order to settle disputes about the existence/attribution of an alleged international wrongful act, or about the lawfulness of any measures resorted to against an alleged wrongdoer. This topic, partly previously considered, was indicated by the Special Rapporteur as an indispensable implementation of a part of the project of the highest importance from the standpoint of the development of a proper law of State Responsibility. The debate on the Special Rapporteur’s suggestions or proposals showed that the majority of the Commission’s members entertained on the subject very conservative views. Those members preferred to leave the matter as it is today, namely, in the hands of States. They did not accept Professor Brierly’s opinion (put forward at the time of the adoption of the International Law Commission’s Statute), that the work of codification could be better performed by universities, the International Law Commission to be entrusted with the task of the progressive development of International Law. The other topic was the Special Rapporteur’s recall of the provisionally adopted Article 19 (as proposed by former Special Rapporteur Roberto Ago) dealing with the categories of internationally wrongful acts to be classified as State crimes, namely as the gravest breaches of the Law of Nations, to be subjected to more severe reactions than those applying to mere “delicts”. The debate proved that the majority of the Commission entertained very strong doubts with regard to the classification of the said article 19’s State crimes. While expecting the Special Rapporteur to make his contribution to the “special regime” to be adopted for State crimes as defined in Ago’s article 19, the Commission indicated the possibility that that Article be abandoned. Read more (txt) >>