submissions
between the parties, in accordance with the provisions of the Rules of
Court.
21. In that regard, even the Applicant refrained from making a firm request for a oneyear period of notice. In the Submissions dated 15 April 2016, one of her lawyers
indeed refers to a reasonable period of notice [paragraph 29] and after indicating that
periods of notice in international practice have been set at one year, six months or
even three months [paragraph 32], he opines that Rwanda’s withdrawal should not
have an immediate effect but should at least enter into force only after a certain
number
of months
[paragraph
33]. On
this point, he concludes
by requesting
that
Rwanda’s withdrawal takes effect only after “a cooling off period” [paragraph 53]. This
goes to show that, even in the view of the Applicant, there should be no automatic and
mechanical application of the one year notice provided for by the Vienna Convention
on the Law of Treaties.
22. In conclusion, it seems to us that, in a judgment in which it was certainly going to
make case-law, the Court did not sufficiently grasp the different facets of the legal
issues
raised and
all the implications of its position,
not only with regard to the
applicability of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties to unilateral acts derived
from treaties, but also with regard to the issue of the notice period in the event of
withdrawal.
PASS
Juge Gérard NYUNGEKO
Robert ENO
sh
Greffier
—
i
Juge Augustino S.L. RAMADHANI
e
ye
J
> Febuary 20'F
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