Monday, September 10, 2007

Update: Sixth Committee of the UN General Assembly

A new session of the UN General Assembly - its sixty-second - begins next Tuesday, September 18. The Sixth Committee (Legal) will convene nearly three weeks later, on Monday, October 8. The Committee's revised provisional programme of work (A/61/458/Add.1) and other documents can be found, for now, here. In addition to the annual reports of the International Law Commission and the UNCITRAL, there are a number of topics of interest on the agenda, including the final form (treaty, General Assembly endorsement, etc.) for the ILC's draft articles on State responsibility, draft articles on diplomatic protection, and draft principles on the allocation of loss in the case of transboundary harm arising out of hazardous activities. Comments received from governments on these subjects can be found in documents A/62/63 and Add.1 (State responsibility) and A/62/118 and Add.1 (diplomatic protection). As is customary, the President of the International Court of Justice will visit the Committee - this year on Friday, November 2. The meeting of Legal Advisers will take place Monday, October 29, and Tuesday, October 30.