Introduction: The Path to the UN Watercourses Convention and Beyond

Subject(s):

Freshwater — Canals — Lakes — Rivers — Boundaries

This chapter provides an overview of the path to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses, focusing on the principal factors that influenced and shaped it. It first reviews the work of two non-governmental organizations that helped lay the groundwork for the Convention, the Institute of International Law (IIL) and the International Law Association (ILA), before discussing the UN General Assembly’s resolution referring the international watercourses topic to the International Law Commission (ILC). It then considers the work of the ILC that provided the basis for the Convention’s negotiation and describes the action on the ILC’s Draft Articles in the UN General Assembly, the Convention’s entry into force, implementation, and reception. It also examines the ILC’s work on transboundary groundwater as an extension of its study of shared freshwater resources.