Legal Nature of Oral International Treaties

Abstract

Oral international treaties can be attributed to one of the sources of international law that are less studied in the legal sciences and rarely used in the practice of interstate relations. Therefore, in the presented article on the basis of dialectical method of research, use of general scientific methods of research, as well as such private scientific methods as: historical legal, comparative legal, method of legal modelling and legal forecasting, the results of the study of legal nature of oral international treaties are presented. The work shows the advantages and disadvantages of such treaties and their attitude to them in the doctrine of international law. The issue of increasing their role in regulating interstate relations is raised. Ordinary and treaty rules of international law governing the process of conclusion, action, amendment, termination of oral international treaties and other matters related to their functioning are considered. The history of formation of oral international agreements are described, their examples are given. Similarity and distinction between oral and written international treaties, interaction of oral international treaties and domestic law are shown. The correlation of the term “oral international agreement” with such terms as “gentleman's agreement”, “verbal agreement”, “verbal arrangement” is revealed. The requirements to be satisfied by modern oral international treaties are substantiated. Among them: conformity of oral international treaties with universally recognized principles of international law (as well as for written international treaties of UN members), non-contradiction of the UN Charter, as well as the legislation of its States; their conclusion within the powers of officials provided by national legislation, international customs or international treaties of the States concerned. It is shown that the intention of the parties to conclude a legally binding oral international treaty, the conviction of States and other subjects of international law in its legal force are the main signs that allow to distinguish this kind of Agreement among other agreements in the international arena that are not legally binding. An oral international treaty proposes to understand the legally binding international agreement concluded between States, other subjects of international law by their authorized representatives orally and regulated International law, regardless of its specific name (“oral international treaty”, “verbal agreement”, “gentleman's agreement”, etc.) and its possible further documentation, designed to regulate inter-state relations and enforced force of the constituent entities of international law.