The operation of international treaties and contracts in the event of armed conflict: Problems reopened by russian aggression against Ukraine

Abstract

War has traditionally been regarded as an event that terminates the operation of treaties. After the prohibition ofwar by theUNCharter and under the influence of the process of globalization, an armed conflict is regarded as an event that does not ipso facto terminate or suspend the operation of treaties, either between states parties to the conflict or a state party to the conflict and a third state. Nowadays, the problem concerning the effect of war on the operation of international agreements, which was not solved by the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, rather belongs to the domain of international customary law. The adoption of the Draft Articles on the Effects of Armed Conflicts on Treaties by the UN International Law Commission in 2011 (as well as a number of earlier, more or less doctrinal, documents such as the 1985 Resolution of the Institute of International Law on the Effects of Armed Conflicts on Treaties) has not solved this problem either, because the character of this document is one of "soft law". For a long time, states avoided solving this problem for political reasons. Settlement of the legal problem was inevitability revived after the start of the Russian aggression against Ukraine in 2014, which affected the operation of (a) bilateral treaties, (b) bilateral contracts and (c) multilateral treaties. A number of bilateral treaties of the parties has been terminated or suspended. Russian aggression has also revealed general trends in current international law, which seek to minimize the impact of war on the continuity of treaties and contracts.