44 Report of the International Law Commission on the work of its fifty-third session acting in the exercise of elements of the governmental authority of the State at whose disposal it is placed. Commentary (1) Article 6 deals with the limited and precise situation in which an organ of a State is effectively put at the disposal of another State so that the organ may temporarily act for its benefit and under its authority. In such a case, the organ, originally that of one State, acts exclusively for the purposes of and on behalf of another State and its conduct is attributed to the latter State alone. (2) The words “placed at the disposal of ” in article 6 express the essential condition that must be met in order for the conduct of the organ to be regarded under international law as an act of the receiving and not of the sending State. The notion of an organ “placed at the disposal of ” the receiving State is a specialized one, implying that the organ is acting with the consent, under the authority of and for the purposes of the receiving State. Not only must the organ be appointed to perform functions appertaining to the State at whose disposal it is placed, but in performing the functions entrusted to it by the beneficiary State, the organ must also act in conjunction with the machinery of that State and under its exclusive direction and control, rather than on instructions from the sending State. Thus article 6 is not concerned with ordinary situations of inter-State cooperation or collaboration, pursuant to treaty or otherwise.130 (3) Examples of situations that could come within this limited notion of a State organ “placed at the disposal” of another State might include a section of the health service or some other unit placed under the orders of another country to assist in overcoming an epidemic or natural disaster, or judges appointed in particular cases to act as judicial organs of another State. On the other hand, mere aid or assistance offered by organs of one State to another on the territory of the latter is not covered by article 6. For example, armed forces may be sent to assist another State in the exercise of the right of collective self-defence or for other purposes. Where the forces in question remain under the authority of the sending State, they exercise elements of the governmental authority of that State and not of the receiving State. Situations can also arise where the organ of one State acts on the joint instructions of its own and another State, or there may be a single entity which is a joint organ of several States. In these cases, the conduct in question is attributable to both States under other articles of this chapter.131 (4) Thus, what is crucial for the purposes of article 6 is the establishment of a functional link between the organ in question and the structure or authority of the receiv130 Thus, the conduct of Italy in policing illegal immigration at sea pursuant to an agreement with Albania was not attributable to Albania: Xhavara and Others v. Italy and Albania, application No. 39473/98, Eur. Court H.R., decision of 11 January 2001. Conversely, the conduct of Turkey taken in the context of the Turkey-European Communities customs union was still attributable to Turkey: see WTO, Report of the Panel, Turkey: Restrictions on Imports of Textile and Clothing Products (WT/DS34/R), 31 May 1999, paras. 9.33–9.44. 131 See also article 47 and commentary. ing State. The notion of an organ “placed at the disposal” of another State excludes the case of State organs, sent to another State for the purposes of the former State or even for shared purposes, which retain their own autonomy and status: for example, cultural missions, diplomatic or consular missions, foreign relief or aid organizations. Also excluded from the ambit of article 6 are situations in which functions of the “beneficiary” State are performed without its consent, as when a State placed in a position of dependence, territorial occupation or the like is compelled to allow the acts of its own organs to be set aside and replaced to a greater or lesser extent by those of the other State.132 (5) There are two further criteria that must be met for article 6 to apply. First, the organ in question must possess the status of an organ of the sending State; and secondly its conduct must involve the exercise of elements of the governmental authority of the receiving State. The first of these conditions excludes from the ambit of article 6 the conduct of private entities or individuals which have never had the status of an organ of the sending State. For example, experts or advisers placed at the disposal of a State under technical assistance programmes do not usually have the status of organs of the sending State. The second condition is that the organ placed at the disposal of a State by another State must be “acting in the exercise of elements of the governmental authority” of the receiving State. There will only be an act attributable to the receiving State where the conduct of the loaned organ involves the exercise of the governmental authority of that State. By comparison with the number of cases of cooperative action by States in fields such as mutual defence, aid and development, article 6 covers only a specific and limited notion of “transferred responsibility”. Yet, in State practice the situation is not unknown. (6) In the Chevreau case, a British consul in Persia, temporarily placed in charge of the French consulate, lost some papers entrusted to him. On a claim being brought by France, Arbitrator Beichmann held that: “the British Government cannot be held responsible for negligence by its Consul in his capacity as the person in charge of the Consulate of another Power.”133 It is implicit in the Arbitrator’s finding that the agreed terms on which the British Consul was acting contained no provision allocating responsibility for the Consul’s acts. If a third State had brought a claim, the proper respondent in accordance with article 6 would have been the State on whose behalf the conduct in question was carried out. (7) Similar issues were considered by the European Commission of Human Rights in two cases relating to the exercise by Swiss police in Liechtenstein of “delegated” powers.134 At the relevant time Liechtenstein was not 132 For the responsibility of a State for directing, controlling or coercing the internationally wrongful act of another, see articles 17 and 18 and commentaries. 133 UNRIAA, vol. II (Sales No. 1949.V.1), p. 1113, at p. 1141 (1931). 134 X and Y v. Switzerland, application Nos. 7289/75 and 7349/76, decision of 14 July 1977; Council of Europe, European Commission of Human Rights, Decisions and Reports, vol. 9, p. 57; and Yearbook of the European Convention on Human Rights, 1977, vol. 20 (1978), p. 372, at pp. 402–406.