Mälksoo: Post-Soviet Eurasia, Uti Possidetis and the Clash between Universal and Russian-Led Regional Understandings of International Law

Lauri Mälksoo (Univ. of Tartu - Law) has published Post-Soviet Eurasia, Uti Possidetis and the Clash between Universal and Russian-Led Regional Understandings of International Law (New York Univ. Journal of International Law and Politics, Vol. 53, no. 3, Summer 2021, p. 787). Here's the abstract:

This article argues that a clash has emerged between the Western universalist and Russian particular concepts of international law, including on the conditions of sovereign statehood in the post-Soviet, or Russia’s former imperial, space. In the post-Soviet space, Moscow has not unconditionally accepted the principle of uti possidetis, i.e., the rule that former boundaries between units of federalism would also constitute borders between new sovereign States. This article interprets Russia’s interventions in the post-Soviet space, as well as recent attempts to create integration law in Eurasia, as Russia’s attempts to create regional international law as the Eurasian concrete order, as opposed to ‘Western’ international law that is based on abstract universal principles.