CYIL vol. 9 (2018)

CYIL 9 ȍ2018Ȏ EXPERIMENTS WITH INTERNATIONAL ADMINISTRATION IN THE PARIS… the concerned river. Also, they had to designate its headquarters and prescribe the manner in which its President is to be nominated. Further, they had to specify the extent of the commission’s powers, particularly in regard to the execution of works of maintenance, control, and improvement on the river system, the financial regime, the fixing and collection of charges, and regulations for navigation. At last, but not at least, the commissions hat to define the sections of the river or its tributaries to which the international regime shall be applied. 41 It is a matter of fact, that delegation of such broad administrative powers to these international commission attracted 42 certain attention of contemporary legal scholarship. Also the issue of jurisdiction leaved open doors for future disagreements over the scope of the commissions jurisdiction, which culminated into the famous judgement of the Permanent Court of International Judgement in 1929. These international commissions took their first meeting in 1920 and in 1922 respectively. They had worked for the next sixteen years, being dissolved in 1936. 43 International Commission of the Straits The Sèvres Treaty 44 too had to address a demand for neutral administration of the two narrow straits, which – together with the Sea of Marmara – form the only maritime connection between the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea. 45 Consequently, the Treaty provided a new regime for the Straits 46 which was based upon almost unrestricted freedom of passage ( liberté de passage et de navigation ) to both commercial and military 47 vessels and aircrafts without distinction of flag. In addition to this, the Treaty had provisions on partition of Turkish territory and on demilitarisation of the Straits. The European coast of the Dardanelles and of the Sea of Marmara would be Greek territory and the remaining area agreed to be in Dresden. Further, the Convention specified the competencies of the International Commission as follows: approving the list containing places of transhipment as prepared by the riparian States (Asrticle 21), right to demand a withdrawal of a navigation permit issued by a riparian State (Article 32), issuing regulations for approving the police regulations of the riparian States with respect to the navigation (Article 34), resolving certain disputes (Article 40) etc. 41 Article 344. 42 KAECKENBEECK, G.: International rivers, A monograph based on international documents (Sweet and Maxwell 1918), HOSTIE, J.: ‘Les actes du Danube et de l’Elbe’ [1923] Revue de droit international et de législation comparée 247-287, WINIARSKI, B.: ‘Principes généraux du droit fluvial international’ [1933] Recueil des cours de l’Académie de Droit International 209-210, WEHLE, L.: ‘International Administration of European Inland Waterways’ [1945] American Journal of International Law 100-120 etc. 43 For details see RASCHED, M.: Die Elbe im Völkerrecht und Gemeinschaftsrecht (Lit Verlag 2002) 34-35. 44 The Sèvres Peace Treaty signed on 10 th April 1920 was concluded between the British Empire, France, Italy, Japan (the principal Allied and Associated Powers) as well as Armenia, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Hedjaz, Poland, Portugal, Romania, State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs (called the Allied and Associated Powers) on the one hand and Turkey. The treaty has never entered into force. 45 There is a number of sources dealing with the legal regime of the Turkish Straits. See eg. (a) DENNIS, A.: ‘The Freedom of the Straits’ [1922] The North American Review 721-734, (b) ROZAKIS, CH.: and STAGOS, P.: The Turkish Straits (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 1987), (c) ÜNLÜ, N.: The Legal Regime of the Turkish Straits (Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 2002), (d) YÜKSEL, I.: ‘The Turkish Straits and the Legal Regime of Passage’ in CARON, D. and ORAL, N. (eds.) Navigating Straits, Challeges for International Law (Brill 2014) 199-219. 46 Including the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara and the Bosphorus. 47 However, the Sèvres Treaty provided in its Article 57, that the stay of such warships at ports in the Straits “shall not exceed twenty-four hours except in case of distress. In such case they shall be bound to leave as soon as possible. An interval of at least twenty-four hours shall always elapse between the sailing of a belligerent ship from the waters and the departure of a ship belonging to an opposing belligerent.”.

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