On 24 September, Andreas Zimmermann , President of the OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, and Ambassador Marja Lehto , its Vice-President, presented the Court to the 71st meeting of the Council of Europe's Committee of Legal Advisers on Public International Law (CAHDI) in Tallinn, Estonia.
They outlined the Court's structure and its two mechanisms for the peaceful settlement of disputes between States: conciliation is compulsory for all States parties by virtue of ratification, and arbitration requires the consent of the States concerned.
President Zimmermann stressed that, in the current geopolitical context, a standing, treaty-based mechanism remains a valuable asset, particularly for disputes between neighbouring OSCE participating States.
Thirty-one of the 34 States parties to the Convention are members of the Council of Europe. The President and Vice-President therefore invited the legal advisers to:
- ratify the Convention, where their State is not yet a party;
- appoint or renew their State's conciliators and arbitrators;
- consider renewing declarations accepting compulsory arbitration, all of which have now expired;
- keep conciliation in mind when a dispute arises.
The Court was established under the 1992 Stockholm Convention on Conciliation and Arbitration within the OSCE and is based in Geneva.
