List of top Legal Studies Questions on Public International Law asked in CLAT PG

The International Law Commission (ILC), in compliance with General Assembly resolution 177 (II), was directed to ”formulate the principles of international law recognized in the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal and in the judgment of the Tribunal”. The ILC’s task was to merely formulate the principles not to express an appreciation of them as principles of International law since they had already been affirmed by the General Assembly. & nbsp;
At its second session in 1950, the ILC adopted a formulation of seven Principles of International Law recognized in the Charter and Judgment of the Nuremberg Tribunal.

  • Principle I: Any person who commits an act which constitutes a crime under international law is responsible therefor and liable to punishment. This is based on the general rule that international law may impose duties directly on individuals.
  • Principle II: The fact that internal law does not impose a penalty for an international crime does not relieve the person who committed the act from international responsibility. This implies the ”supremacy” of international law over national law.
  • Principle III: The fact that a person acted as Head of State or responsible Government official does not relieve him from responsibility under international law.
  • Principle IV: Acting pursuant to an order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.
  • Principle V: Any person charged with a crime under international law has the right to a fair trial on the facts and law.
  • Principle VI: sets out the crimes punishable under international law:
    • Crimes against peace: Includes planning, preparation, initiation, or waging of a war of aggression or a war in violation of international treaties, as well as participation in a conspiracy for these acts. The ILC understands the term ”waging of a war of aggression” to refer only to high-ranking military personnel and high State officials. The Tribunal affirmed the illegality of aggressive war based on the Kellogg-Briand Pact.
    • War crimes: Violations of the laws or customs of war, such as murder, ill-treatment, deportation, killing of hostages, and plunder.
    • Crimes against humanity: Murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhuman acts or persecutions on political, racial, or religious grounds, when done in execution of or in connection with a crime against peace or a war crime. These acts may constitute crimes against humanity even if committed by the perpetrator against their own population.
  • Principle VII: Complicity in the commission of any of the crimes listed in Principle VI is a crime under international law.

The ILC also considered the General Assembly’s invitation to study the desirability and possibility of establishing an international judicial organ for the trial of persons charged with genocide or other crimes. While some members questioned its effectiveness, particularly for grave international crimes, others argued that the creation of such a jurisdiction was desirable as an effective contribution to world peace and security, serving as a deterrent against aggressors.

International Organisations have had a significant impact on the development of international law, effectively contributing to the establishment of a global constitutional system. According to Henkin, international organisations “represent new laws at its birth, for it is itself a child of law”. For instance, the Charter of the United Nations (UN) and its specialised agencies and other international organisations have played a crucial role in shaping international law. The World Health Organisation (WHO), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) are among the organisations that have contributed to the significant transformation of international law sources, actors and processes over the past century. Since its establishment with an initial membership of fifty-one states, UN has undergone significant development, becoming a diverse and multidimensional global institution with a current membership of 193 nations. The UN has positioned itself as a global constitutional organisation, striving to safeguard and uphold a minimal world order. Numerous experts in International Law recognise the UN as a crucial international organisation for the maintenance of peace and security.
(Rawa Almakky,“The Role of International Organisations in the Development of International Law: An Analytical Assessment of the United Nations”, International Scientific Journal on LAW and WORLD, Vol. 9 No. 28, 2023)
The consensual structure of the international legal order, with its strong emphasis on the sovereign equality of states, has always been somewhat precarious. In different waves over the centuries, it has been attacked for its incongruence with the realities of inequality in international politics, for its tension with ideals of democracy and human rights, and for standing in the way of more effective problem-solving in the international community. While surprisingly resilient in the face of such challenges, the consensual structure has seen renewed attacks in recent years. In the 1990s, those attacks were mainly “moral” in character. They were related to the liberal turn in international law, and some of them, under the banner of human rights, aimed at weakening principles of nonintervention and immunity. Others, starting from the idea of an emerging “international community,” questioned the prevailing contractual models of international law and emphasised the rise of norms and processes reflecting community values rather than individual state interests. Since the beginning of the new millennium, the focus has shifted, and attacks are more often framed in terms of effectiveness or global public goods. Classical international law is regarded as increasingly incapable of providing much-needed solutions for the challenges of a globalized world; as countries become ever more interdependent and vulnerable to global challenges, an order that safeguards states’ freedoms at the cost of common policies is often seen as anachronistic. According to this view, what is needed-and what we are likely to see-is a turn to nonconsensual lawmaking mechanisms, especially through powerful international institutions with majoritarian voting rules.
[The extract is part of the article “The Decay of Consent: International Law in an Age of Global Public Goods” by Krisch N, in the American Journal of International Law].
In its second preliminary objection, Myanmar submits that The Gambia’s Application is inadmissible because The Gambia lacks standing to bring this case before the Court. In particular, Myanmar considers that only “injured States”, which Myanmar defines as States “adversely affected by an internationally wrongful act”, have standing to present a claim before the Court. In Myanmar’s view, The Gambia is not an “injured State” (a term that Myanmar appears to use interchangeably with the term “specially affected State”) and has failed to demonstrate an individual legal interest. Therefore, according to Myanmar, The Gambia lacks standing under Article IX of the Genocide Convention.
Myanmar draws a distinction between the right to invoke State responsibility under general international law and standing before the Court. It argues that, even if it were established that a “non-injured” Contracting Party to the Genocide Convention has the right to invoke another State’s responsibility for violations of the Convention, this would not necessarily entail the right to bring a case before the Court. To this end, Myanmar contends that there exists a difference between the common interest in the accomplishment of the purposes of the Genocide Convention and a State’s individual legal interest that may be enforce through the institution of proceedings before the Court. In Myanmar’s view, only States “specially affected” by an internationally wrongful act have standing to bring a claim before the Court.
Myanmar further submits that The Gambia’s claims are inadmissible in so far as they are not brought before the Court in accordance with the rule concerning the nationality of claims which, according to Myanmar, is reflected in Article 44 (a) of the International Law Commission’s Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts. Myanmar asserts that the rule concerning the nationality of claims applies to the invocation of responsibility by both “injured” and “non injured” States and irrespective of whether the obligation breached is an erga omnes partes or erga omnes obligation. Consequently, in Myanmar’s view, The Gambia lacks standing to invoke Myanmar’s responsibility.
The Russian Federation’s specific claims alleging genocide, and invoking that alleged genocide as the basis for military action against Ukraine, include:
a. On 21 February 2022, the President of the Russian Federation stated in an official address that there was a “genocide” occurring in Ukraine, “which almost 4 million people are facing.”…
b. The President of the Russian Federation then announced a “special military operation” and stated that “[t]he purpose of this operation is to protect people who, for eight years now, have been facing humiliation and genocide perpetrated by the Kiev regime.”…
c. In an interview on 25 February 2022, the Russian Ambassador to the European Union was asked about President Putin’s reference to genocide as justification for Russia’s unlawful acts against Ukraine and said “[w]e can turn to the official term of genocide as coined in international law. If you read the definition it fits pretty well.”…
Therefore, the parties’ dispute over first, the existence of acts of genocide, and second, Russia’s claim to legal authority to take military action in and against Ukraine to punish and prevent such alleged genocide, is a dispute that concerns the interpretation, application or fulfilment of the [1] Convention. Accordingly, the Court should recognize its jurisdiction on a prima facie basis for purposes of indicating provisional measures.
[Excerpted from: Request for the Indication of Provisional Measures Submitted by Ukraine, February 26, 2022, in Allegations of Genocide under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Ukraine v. Russian Federation), International Court of Justice]
The International Court of Justice recalls that, pursuant to Article 41 of its Statute, it has the power to indicate provisional measures when irreparable prejudice could be caused to rights which are the subject of judicial proceedings or when the alleged disregard of such rights may entail irreparable consequences. However, this power will be exercised only if there is urgency, in the sense that there is a real and imminent risk that irreparable prejudice will be caused to the rights claimed before the Court gives its final decision. The condition of urgency is met when the acts susceptible of causing irreparable prejudice can “occur at any moment” before the Court makes a final decision on the case. The Court must therefore consider whether such a risk exists at this stage of the proceedings. The Court is not called upon, for the purposes of its decision on the Request for the indication of provisional measures, to establish the existence of breaches of obligations under the Genocide Convention, but to determine whether the circumstances require the indication of provisional measures for the protection of the right found to be plausible. Having determined that Ukraine can plausibly assert a right under the Genocide Convention and that there is a link between this right and the provisional measures requested, the Court then considers whether irreparable prejudice could be caused to this right and whether there is urgency, in the sense that there is a real and imminent risk that irreparable prejudice will be caused to this right before the Court gives its final decision.
To every State whose land territory is at any place washed by the sea, international law attaches a corresponding portion of maritime territory... International law does not say to a State: “You are entitled to claim territorial waters if you want them”. No maritime State can refuse them. International law imposes upon a maritime State, certain obligations and confers upon it certain rights arising out of the sovereignty which it exercises over its maritime territory. The possession of this territory is not optional, not dependent upon the will of the State, but compulsory. In the ninth edition of Oppenheim’s International Law, the nationality of ships in the high seas has been referred to in paragraph 287, wherein it has been observed that the legal order on the high seas is based primarily on the rule of International Law which requires every vessel sailing the high seas to possess the nationality of, and to fly the flag of, one State, whereby a vessel and persons on board the vessel are subjected to the law of the State of the flag and in general subject to its exclusive jurisdiction. In paragraph 291 of the aforesaid discourse, the learned author has defined the scope of flag jurisdiction to mean that jurisdiction in the high seas is dependent upon the Maritime Flag under which vessels sail, because no State can extend its territorial jurisdiction to the high seas. Of course, the aforesaid principle is subject to the right of ‘hot pursuit’, which is an exception to the exclusiveness of the flag jurisdiction over ships on the high seas in certain special cases.
The Supreme Court has observed that in international human rights law, equality is founded upon two complementary principles: non-discrimination and reasonable differentiation. The principle of non-discrimination seeks to ensure that all persons can equally enjoy and exercise all their rights and freedoms. Discrimination occurs due to arbitrary denial of opportunities for equal participation. Equality not only implies preventing discrimination (example, the protection of individuals against unfavourable treatment by introducing anti-discrimination laws), but goes beyond in remedying discrimination against groups suffering systematic discrimination in society. In concrete terms, it means embracing the notion of positive rights, affirmative action and reasonable accommodation. The move from the patronising and paternalistic approach to persons with disabilities represented by the medical model to viewing them as members of the community with equal rights has also been reflected in the evolution of international standards relating specifically to disabilities, as well as in moves to place the rights of persons with disabilities within the category of universal human rights. Disabled people no longer see their physical or mental limitations as a source of shame or as something to overcome in order to inspire others. What non-disabled people do not understand is that people with disabilities also have some rights, hopes and aspirations as everyone else. They do not want to depend on others. For this they want the proper environment to grow. It is the thinking of Disability Rights Movement, USA that it is not so much the disabled individual who needs to change, but the society
Conceptually, extradition is a rather complex jurisprudential zone as it has encompassed within itself various trajectories of apparently conflicting ideas. Generally, a State’s criminal jurisdiction extends over offences committed within its geographical boundaries but it is the common experience of all the countries that often a criminal committing an offence in one country flees to another country and thus seeks to avoid conviction and the consequential punishment. This poses a threat in all civilised countries to a fair adjudication of crime and sustaining the constitutional norms of rule of law. To remedy such anomalous and unjust situation, extradition has been evolved by way of international treaty obligation which ensures a mode of formal surrender of an accused by one country to another based on reciprocal arrangements. In India, extradition has not been defined under the Extradition Act, 1962. However, extradition has been defined as: ‘… the surrender by one nation to another of an individual accused or convicted of an offence outside of its own territory, and within the territorial jurisdiction of the other, which, being competent to try and to punish him, demands the surrender.’ But extradition is different from deportation by which competent State authorities order a person to leave a country and prevent him from returning to the same territory. Extradition is also different from exclusion, by which an individual is prohibited from staying in one part of a sovereign State. Both deportation and exclusion basically are nonconsensual exercise whereas extradition is based on a consensual treaty obligation between the requesting State and the requested State.
The Principles of state responsibility dictate that states are accountable for breaches of International Law. Such breaches of treaty or customary international law enable the injured state to maintain a claim against the violating state, whether by way of diplomatic action or by way of recourse to international mechanisms where such are in place with regard to subject matter in issue. Recourse to International Arbitration or to the International Court of Justice is also possible provided the necessary jurisdictional basis has been established. Customary International Law imposes several important fundamental obligations upon the States in the area of environmental protection. The view that the International law supports an approach predicated upon absolute territorial sovereignty, so that a state could do as it liked irrespective of the consequences upon other states has long been discredited. The basic duty upon states is not so to act as to injure the rights of other states. This duty has evolved partly out of the regime concerned with international waterways. In the [1] case, the Permanent Court of International Justice noted that 'this community of interest in a navigable river becomes the basis of common legal right, the essential features of which are the perfect equality of all riparian states in the use of the whole course of the river and the exclusion of any preferential privileges of any riparian state in relation to others.'. But the principle is of far wide application. It was held in [2] case that the concept of territorial sovereignty incorporated an obligation to protect within the territory the rights of other states. It has now been established that it was an obligation of every state to not to allow knowingly its territory to be used for acts contrary to the rights of other states. This judicial approach has now been widely reaffirmed in international instruments. Article [3] of the Law of Sea Convention, 1982 provides that 'states shall take all measures necessary to ensure that activities under their jurisdiction and control are so conducted as not to cause damage by pollution to other states and their environment.' It is sometimes argued that the appropriate standard for the conduct of states in this field is that of strict liability. In other words, states are under an absolute obligation to prevent pollution and are thus liable for its effects irrespective of fault.
Terrorism has become an international issue for long without finding any solution. Briefly explain and critically evaluate the same in the light of contemporary developments.
What is meant by generic drugs? Explain its importance in the light of judicial decisions in India.
The following Committee cannot hear individual complaints of human rights violations:
CEDAW was adopted by the U. N. General Assembly in the year:
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted on:
The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court was adopted in the year:
World Intellectual Property Organization is a specialized agency of:
'Jus cogens' means: