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The Nordic Council: a Unique Factor in International Law

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The Nordic Council: a Unique Factor in International Law THE NORDIC COUNCIL: A UNIQUE FACTOR IN INTERNATIONAL LAW By Dr. GUSTAF PETRÉN Chapter VIII of the Charter of the United Nations contains regula- tions for regional agreements. The object of these is to provide parti- cular groups of countries with opportunities of pursuing activities in the interest of peace and security According to the Swedish Foreign Ministry's commentary on the Charterl) one of the reasons for the regulations was the idea of pan-American co-operation, and the same commentary also mentions the Arab Federation In 1951-1952, when the Nordic Council came into existence, its founders hardly had the said U N Charter legulations in mind, and in fact these were not mentioned during the preparatory work in con- nection with the Council's formation In spite of that the Council may be regarded as a regional organisation of the type contemplated in art 52 of the U. N Charter Nevertheless amongst such regional organisations, the Nordic Council occupies a special position It should be noted, firstly, that the Council does not function within the framework of an already permanently organised associa- tion of countries In several respects the Nordic Council presents pa- rallels with - for example - the inter-parliamentary Advisory Coun- cil of Benelux, although an important difference is that the last- named Council cannot be regarded as an independent institution but rather constitutes one of many bodies which are active within the Benelux economic union. And the parliamentary assemblies of, for example, the European Economic Union (the Six), and of many other organisations for European co-operation, reveal themselves even more clearly as merely one of the bodies through which their organi- sations work 2) Even in making a comparison with the Council of Europe - and systematic comparisons have often been made - we find the diffe- rence already mentioned Chapter 2 of the Council of Europe charter provides that countries shall be members of the Council The Coun- cil of Europe has in accordance with art 10 of its Charter two bodies, namely the Committee of Ministers and the Advisory Council Thus from the angle of international law it may be regarded as a relatively 347 loose association of countries, essentially constructed in a way no different to that of NATO, for example - It is against the background of the above that the situation a unique one from the angle of international law - of the Nordic Council -will now be considered 3) In connection with an account of the Council's composition, tasks and working methods, further light will be thrown on the special problems arising from the struc- ture of the organisation But before I deal with those matters, some- thing needs to be said concerning the juridical foundations of the Council. Even as regards this basic respect, there are obvious depar- tures from what is customary Almost without exception, organisations for international co-- operation with functions similar to those of the Nordic Council have come into existence through binding agreements entered into by the countries concerned It is worth noticing that this was not the course chosen when the Nordic Council was formed Instead there was utilization of the method usual in Nordic legislative co-operation, with the implication that each country, quite independently and un- hampered by international juridical obligations, would by applying internal juridical norms arrive at a decision which as regards their content would be identical with or similar to the decision reached in the same manner by each of the other countries Not least remarkable is the fact that this method was obviously considered so natural that it needed no special justification during the preliminary work. The Council's activities are thus based upon national Nordic Coun- cil Statutes The only technical complication which arose from this mode of procedure was in connection with the coming into force of the statutes In each of the three countries Denmark, Norway and Sweden, the condition laid down was that corresponding statutes had been accepted in the two neighbouring countries; see 14 § of the Charter in its original form as well as 15 § of the same document, which contains a special regulation as regards Iceland 4) This Charter for the Nordic Council, embodying the basic provi- sions for its activities, exists to day in five or more correctly six texts, since quite naturally it has been drawn up in the languages of - the respective countries in two languages in Finland, in accord- ance with regulations there ') There is nothing to guarantee that the different texts of the Charter will have exactly identical contents This was not so as regards the original texts, characterized as they were by slight departures from each other6) However, revisions to the Charter in 1957 removed those variations, and at the same time .
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