wish to provide for the convention to terminate if, as a result of enunciation, the number of parties to the convention falls below the number required to bring it into force.
Article V
7.
I see no objection to the procedure proposed for amendments but again it is for those responsible for the policy of the convention to decide whether it is acceptable from their point of view.
Article VI
8.
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The question of whether reservations should be allowed, and if so in respect of which Articles, is a matter for the Home Office and others to decide. Some attention does however need to be given to the relationship between paragraphs 1, 2 and 3. In paragraph 2 it is not clear whether this paragraph applies to all reservations or only those made in accordance with paragraph 1. It seems to me that it would be logical to provide that reservations permitted by paragraph 1 should be compatible with the object and purpose of the convention. But I am not sure that it really makes sense for the question of whether a reservation is incompatible with the object and purpose of the convention to be decided by the vote of two-thirds of the parties to the convention. This seems a rather high number and in any event the question of whether or not a reservation is compatible is essentially a legal question which hardly seems suitable to be decided by some kind of qualified majority.
Article VII
It is UK policy to favour the compulsory settlement of disputes. We should therefore favour variant (a), although we are more likely to end up with variant (b).
9.
Article VIII
10. This Article provides for notifications etc and is accept- able.
11. I do not think it would be necessary for an FCO Legal Adviser to attend the discussions in Vienna just for the final clauses. We can presumably provide the delegation with briefing on these and they would be able to seek instructions if there are any problems.
30 September 1987
Gramat
K J Chamberlain Legal Advisers
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