A reservation is a process engaged by States in the course of enunciating their consensus to be

bound by a treaty.
The two contributing states may disagree over certain terms of the treaty which is to bind them
in the negotiations leading to a bilateral party. Thus, they may renegotiate the treaty in order to reach a
settlement or discontinue the effort together. Nevertheless, in multilateral treaties, it is too much to
presume that all the negotiating states will come to an agreement on every provision and it is doubtful
that all differences can be resolved through changes of emphasis or substance in the proposed draft.
Therefore, International Law acknowledges that states may be able to become parties to treaties
deprived of agreeing upon all of the provisions. This is accomplished by means of reservations to the
treaty and their validity and consequence are dealt with the Vienna Convention.
Reservations can be regarded as unilateral statements made by a state at the time it gives its
consent to be bound and which are intended to modify or exclude an otherwise binding treaty
obligation. In some cases, reservation may not be effective until it has been accepted by parties to the
treaty, but this does not destroy its essential character as a unilateral act as quoted under Article
2(1)(d)
1
of The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969.
Prior to the 1969 Vienna Convention, there was some disagreement as to the effects of
reservation on a states consent to a multilateral treaty. The approach adopted in the practice of the
League of Nation was that if a state made a reservation to a multilateral treaty that reservation had to
be accepted by all the other parties to the treaty. If it was not, the state making the reservation could
not be regarded as a party to the treaty, even in respect of those states that did accept the reservation.
This rule was adopted to ensure the integrity and uniformity of multilateral treaty obligations, especially
in relation to those matters where it was desirable to create uniform and certain legal regime.
However, in the practice of other states, especially those of the Pan-America Union, such an
approach was thought too rigid, for it could exclude many states from the operation of a treaty when
their reservations had little to do with the central object and purpose of the treaty.
2

According to the Article 19 of the VCLT
3
, reservations can be made except if the reservation is
prohibited by the treaty. For example the 1995 Agreement for Implementation of the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 relating to the Conservation and Management
of Straddling Fish Stocks prohibited reservations in the final treaty text. The US, when ratifying warned
that it may not agree to treaties bearing such in the future, when the treaty provides that only specified
reservations, which do not include the reservation in question may be made or if the reservation is
incompatible with the object and purpose of the treaty.
The last point is a replication of ICJ opinion on the Convention on Genocide in 1951. This
Convention had been universally approved by the General Assembly. However, states could not ratify

1
The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969, Article 2(1)(d)
2
Martin Dixon (2005) International Law, 5th edn., United States: Oxford.
3
The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969, Article 19
this treaty because of its ambiguity in defining genocide, and especially because the treaty was silent on
the question of reservations. The ICJ when asked for an advisory opinion ruled that it could certainly not
be inferred from the silence of an article providing for reservations in a multilateral convention that
the contracting states are prohibited from making reservations. Besides,
account should also be taken of the fact that the absence of such an article can be explained by the
desire not to invite a multiplicity of reservations.
Regarding the meeting point amongst sovereignty and reservations to treaties, the court
proposed that it cannot allocate the view that any state eligible to become a party to the convention
may do so while making any reservation it chooses by virtue of its sovereignty. It is evident that so
extreme an application of the idea of state sovereignty could lead to a complete carelessness of the
purpose and determination of the convention.
4

Article 20 of the VCLT
5
monitors acceptance of and opposition to reservations where a
reservation deliberately authorized by a treaty does not necessitate any upcoming acceptance by the
other contracting states unless the treaty prescribes as such. A reservation obliges acceptance by all the
parties when it appears from the limited number of the negotiating States and the purpose and
determination of a treaty that the application of the treaty in its totality between all the states is a
crucial state of the consent of each one to be bound by the treaty. Moreover, a reservation requires the
acceptance of the competent organ of that organization when a treaty is a fundamental mechanism of
an international organization.
In conclusion, if the reservation is not prohibited or not expressly permitted and the
multilateral treaty is not in one of the special classes, then the acceptance of ones state reservation by
another state means that the multilateral treaty comes into force between the reserving state and the
accepting state. Additionally, opposition to a states reservation by another state does not stop the
entry into force of the treaty between the reserving state and the objecting state unless a contrary
intent is unquestionably articulated by the objecting state and obviously, if the objecting state has
acknowledged that it does not regard the reserving state a s a party to the treaty, then the treaty does
not administer their relations.
6







4
Sawn Osakue (2010) Reservation to Treaties, Available at:
http://www.academia.edu/1129892/Reservation_to_Treaties (Accessed: 14th August 2014).
5
The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969, Article 20
6
Stephen Hall (2006) International Law, Hong Kong: LexisNexis.