After 30 years of negotiations, the Rhine river is still very polluted. Although the concentration of some pollutants has diminished during the past few years, the quantity of other harmful substances is still increasing. This lack of progress can be explained to a large extent by a set of peculiar circumstances which seems to be unique for the Rhine. The most important of these circumstances is the international dimension of the situation. The main stem of the Rhine flows through the sovereign territories of Switzerland, the Federal Republic of Germany, France and the Netherlands. Its drainage area, moreover, also covers Italy, Austria, Luxemburg and Belgium. Obviously, no anti-pollution policy can hope to be effective until at least the most directly concerned of these eight States have reached agreement on common objectives and common measures. Reaching agreement, however, is complicated by the problem of conflicting uses which may be more intricate for the Rhine than for any other international river.

From 1 January 1982 the Act of 4 February 1981 (Off. Gaz. 1981, No. 35) dealing with the institution of the National Ombudsman and the amendment of a number of laws, entered into force. From this date there has been a national Ombudsman in the Netherlands. His function within the organisation of the State is comparable to the General Chamber of Audit, i.e., a High Council of State.

At the present time, the world commodity trade is primarily carried by ships. Merchant fleet and fishing vessels of 10,000 gross tonnage of more than thirty nations sail in and out of the port areas throughout the world carrying passengers and cargoes including inflammable gas and pollutant chemicals. The rapidly increasing intensity of traffic, the size of vessels, the speed of container and other ships, the growing danger of collision, loss of life and pollution underscores an important need for improved maritime communication.

According to the doctrine of optional choice of law, civil courts ignore the foreign elements of a multistate case and apply their own substantive law, if neither of the parties has asserted that foreign law is applicable. The courts do not apply the choice of law rules of their own motion. The principal argument normally raised in favour of this doctrine is that it would serve the quality of the adjudication. The application of foreign law is a difficult task since, usually, the courts (and the local lawyers) lack the necessary expertise in applying another country's laws. Under an optional choice of law the problematic application of foreign law can be omitted if neither of the parties has invoked that law. In most European countries the doctrine has not been adopted. This article examines the question whether or not the introduction of an optional choice of law would be desirable in the Netherlands. It is argued that a duty for the courts to raise the choice of law issue ex officio is more in tune with the present developments in Dutch law regarding the respective roles of the parties and the judge in civil litigation. Moreover, there are other solutions available and conceivable to deal with the problems concerning the application of foreign law.

In George H. Sabine's great work, A History of Political Thought, he makes the following overall judgment on Grotius’ writing:

“Grotius' importance in the history of jurisprudence rests not upon a theory of the state or upon anything that he had to say about constitutional law, but upon his conception of a law regulating the relations between the sovereign states.”

Of all the four Conventions the second Convention conforms most nearly with existing customary law and its contents are, at the same time, the most varied of them all. They comprise, in fact, all the traditional solutions to the various problems to which the regime of the high seas has, through the centuries, given rise. They almost form an extract from the many textbooks of public international law dealing with the high seas and there is hardly an element of surprise or novelty in them.

Le 28 septembre 1955 la Commission Permanente de Conciliation franco-suisse s'est réunie au Palais de la Paix. Elle a été convoquée pour examiner deux différends qui se sont élevés entre la Confédération suisse d'une part et la République française de l'autre, et pour s'efforcer de concilier les Parties.

One of the objects of the Bank for International Settlements, as laid down in Article 3 of its Statutes, is “to act as trustee or agent in regard to international financial settlements entrusted to it under agreements with the parties concerned”. This text was adopted pursuant to the Final Act of the Hague Conference of 20 January 1930, and has remained unaltered since then. In fact it formed an annex to the Constituent Charter of the Bank, the text of the Constituent Charter being itself embodied in the convention respecting the Bank for International Settlements entered into at The Hague between the Governments of Germany Belgium, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Japan of the one part and the Government of the Swiss Confederation of the other part. This Convention was one of the many separate but related agreements which were simultaneously executed, or approved in form, at The Hague on 20 January 1930 to give effect to the Young Plan and thus settle the reparations question.

The Belgo-Spanish case concerning the Barcelona Traction, Light and Power Company, Ltd. (hereafter called Barcelona Traction), terminated in its preliminary phase by the Judgment of 24 July 1964, had had a prelude in 1958–1961, hence its official sub-title “New Application: 1962.” A corresponding action was in fact already instituted by a unilateral Belgian Application against Spain, dated 15 September 1958, filed on the following 23 September, but the proceedings thus initiated were discontinued by a unilateral communication addressed to the President of the Court by the Belgian Government on 23 March 1961, not opposed by the Spanish Government, and officially recorded by Order of the Court of 10 April 1961 (I.C.J. Reports 1961, p. 9).

Restrictions imposed by domestic law do not excuse a State from due performance of international legal obligations. Either in observance of this principle, or as a sheer coincidence, most States have a framework of domestic legislation that, to varying degrees, would facilitate compliance with international legal obligations. But, as Wallace observes, ‘there is no universal practice stipulating how States should incorporate international law into their domestic legal systems and it is a State's perception of international law which determines the way in which international law becomes part of municipal law’.

In the present writer's view, certain decisions of international organizations are to be recognized as manifestations of international law in their own right; those, namely, which address themselves to the members of the relevant organization, or to some of them, and bind them as to their conduct. Being manifestations in written form, their interpretation may as much constitute a problem as does the interpretation of treaties. The main question, here, is whether the methods and rules of treaty interpretation also apply to the interpretation of these “conductdecisions” of international organizations.

Following the worst industrial accident in history, the leak of poisonous methyl isocyanate gas in Bhopal, India and the deaths of more than 2,000 people with injuries to more than 200,000, suits were soon brought in the United States against Union Carbide Corporation, the owner of a little over 50 percent of the stock in Union Carbide India Limited, the owner and operator of the disastrous plant. The American suits were consolidated in one action before the United States Federal District Court for the Southern District of New York. The Federal District Court, however, dismissed the action on the grounds of forum non conveniens, deciding that the Bhopal case would be more properly litigated in India. The District Court's opinion was endorsed by the Federal Circuit Court for the Second Circuit, also concluding that India, not the United States, was the appropriate situs for the trial.

The events in this world consist of a rather confused complex of facts, opinions and comments, in which truth and falsehood can hardly be distinguished. Factual information is, however, a prerequisite for an impartial and frank appreciation of these matters. It is above all in international politics that opposed versions of the facts often make a clear view of the situation impossible.

One of the basic principles of Dutch civil procedural law is reflected in the requirement that the defendant must have the opportunity of expressing his point of view in court. This principle of “auditur et altera pars” is closely linked to another fundamental principle of Dutch procedural law, viz., the principle requiring that all the parties in a case should be treated on an equal basis. Stein argues that “these principles would not be realized if the law had not laid down special provisions to ensure that the defendant is informed of the case made against him to enable him to have an opportunity of opposing it himself”. The defendant is involved in the case once the preliminary summons has been served. In the law of the Netherlands – and of most other countries – the position of a defendant resident in the country concerned is hedged with safeguards. Various steps must be taken to inform the defendant regarding the case made against him. In most cases it is only a consequence of the defendant's own actions if he remains ignorant of the case against him.

In an article published in this Journal in 1969, entitled “An Evaluation of the Leading Principles of the Treaty on Outer Space of 27th January 1967”, the present writer gave some consideration to the nature and content of the fundamental principles laid down in this Treaty viz. the principle of freedom of outer space for exploration and use and the principle of outer space including the Moon and other celestial bodies being not subject to national appropriation. Attention was drawn to certain ambiguities and inconsistencies in the text and to the difficulties in ascertaining the common intention of the authors of the Treaty.

1. A little over twelve years ago the Kingdom of the Netherlands ratified the European Convention of Human Rights and its First Additional Protocol. This study constitutes an inquiry into the application in the Netherlands of the rights guaranteed by the Convention and the Protocol, the influence they have exercised on the State organs that create or apply the law and their impact on the Dutch legal order in general. Such a study is the more called for, since the self-executing provisions of the Convention and Protocol, after publication, are directly applicable in the municipal legal order of the Netherlands, without any transformation or incorporation into national law being necessary. Moreover, these provisions take precedence over any contrary provisions of municipal law, whether enacted before or after the coming into force of the Convention. It can thus be said that the Dutch legal system— which will be explained hereafter in greater detail—perhaps more than that of any other Party to the Convention allows those falling within its ambit to profit from the rights and freedoms which the Convention extends. It will be interesting to note to what extent actual practice in the Netherlands with regard to the Convention conforms to this theory. A survey of Dutch practice would moreover also allow of comparisons with that in other States parties to the Convention.