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North Korea's disclosure in October 2002 of its nuclear program based on uranium enrichment and its withdrawal from the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in January 2003, have led to an acute international crisis. The North Korean crisis is not new; the world has witnessed a similar crisis in 1992, when North Korea threatened to withdraw from the NPT and which eventually led to the 1994 Agreed Framework. The United States does not have a clear policy on North Korea to date. Due to a high degree of mistrust and to limited and confusing information coming from Pyongyang, two different views have been developed on North Korea. The first view is that North Korea does have real security concerns and Kim Jung Il is merely trying to assure his position as a leader and to safeguard against a U.S. attack. The second view which seems to be embraced by the majority of American politicians is that North Korea is using its nuclear weapon program to blackmail the U.S. and to receive such benefits as oil and food. In this paper I will try to explore the two opposing views and try to come to a conclusion on the whether North Korea's security concerns are grounded or not.

This article appeared in Strategic Insights (May 2003), v.2 no.5 ; North Korea's surprise admission last October to a secret nuclear weapons program based on uranium enrichment triggered a cascading breakdown of the 1994 Agreed Framework structure that had kept North Korea's more advanced plutonium-based nuclear program in check. By year's end North Korea had expelled United Nations inspectors and removed monitoring equipment at its Yongbyon nuclear complex, announced its withdrawal from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and begun preparations to restart its plutonium reprocessing facility. This twin proliferation danger surpasses even the apex of the 1993-4 North Korean crisis that nearly triggered a U.S. military attack. The Bush administration's de facto policy of hostile neglect toward North Korea has contributed to this crisis. Although North Korea's uranium-based program began well before the Bush team took office, the administration bears some responsibility for inciting acceleration of this program and for fostering the fragile conditions under which the program's revelation quickly precipitated a complete breakdown of U.S.-North Korea relations. Unfortunately, even as administration supporters have acknowledged the need for a new approach, there remains insufficient appreciation that the deficiency of the current administration's posture has been as much neglect as hostility.

In the late nineteen-fifties and earl y nineteen-sixties, France, under the leadership of President Charles de Gaulle, aligned its foreign and domestic policies to allow itself to become an independent world power. Many of these policies, although potentially beneficial to the French objectives had direct, specific effects upon other countries. Although it is most difficult to analyze and dissect each and every decision or the French government, there were some decisions which were particularly relevant in regard to the total international situation. In this category would be the French decision in the mid-sixties to establish a course or military self-determination and to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization military alliance. Initial reaction to this decision would affect policy decisions concerning the military capability of the NATO alliance with the geographical, tactical. and personnel void created by such a French decision. Further investigation is necessary; however, to comprehend how such a unilateral decision could affect regional and international politics. Such was the case with the French decision to withdraw from NATO. World events, most specifically the Berlin Crisis and the Cuban missile crisis, had made the world governments acutely aware of the possibilities of nuclear confrontation. With the imminent nuclear capability of France, Communist China, India, and other nations of the world it was becoming apparent to the major nations of the world that some type of agreement was necessary to halt the possible, if not probable, proliferation of nuclear weapons. Speculation and discussion regarding an agreement to ban the spread of nuclear information had been a real possibility from the time of the initial Moscow treaty banning nuclear testing. As world events made such an agreement seem more inevitable, the French took their action regarding military affiliation with the NATO alliance. This action raised several situations which could develop into specific problems. Who would take France's place on the European continent; would nuclear weapons be necessary to fill the void left by France? Would the Soviet Union use this action to test the military and political strength of the NATO alliance? To this point there is no known work which deals with the effects of the French withdrawal from the NATO alliance and any subsequent effect that had upon the successful negotiation of a nuclear non-proliferation treaty. In this regard, we shall see how the French action led t o deviations in the normal U.S. NAT0 policies and subsequently how t he French action threatened the Non-proliferation Treaty1 negotiations.

ABSTRACT. The outcome of the United Kingdom's 'Brexit' referendum on leaving the European Union necessarily entails both a reconsideration of the status of Gibraltar and changes in Spain's perspective on a solution to the dispute. Following Brexit, negotiations on the UK's withdrawal from the EU will not only pave the way for a new European and international legal framework, but will also create a historic opportunity for Spain to redefine its relationship with Gibraltar, offering the possibility of new approaches to resolve this historical dispute.After the crisis of 2013, negotiations reached a stalemate, but the unexpected outcome of the Brexit referendum could have tragic consequences for Gibraltar because the obligation to negotiate the UK's withdrawal from the EU will likewise oblige Gibraltar to redefine its legal status with the EU, which constitutes the legal framework of greatest practical daily application, together with two other international legal frameworks, namely the Treaty of Utrecht and the UN declaration on decolonisation. The European framework will continue to apply for at least the two years during which withdrawal negotiations are held, providing sufficient legal certainty concerning applicable law in the coming years. However, the effects of uncertainty could have a very negative impact on the economy of Gibraltar, whose population adopted a clear stance in favour of 'Bremain' in the referendum. Furthermore, a possible return to the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht has raised fears of the very probable legality of closing the border, at Spain's instigation, if EU law ceases to be applicable in the future.The unavoidable renegotiation of the status of Gibraltar within the EU will inevitably involve Spain, which in 1986 did not question the status endowed in 1972. In the present context, however, Spain could leverage the requirement for unanimity at several crucial moments during the process of negotiating British withdrawal as regulated by Art. 50 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU); thus, various possible future scenarios for Gibraltar, such as the Norwegian or Swiss models or the antecedent of Greenland, will depend on Spain's consent. In addition, solutions that seek to maintain application of the European Single Market to Gibraltar would in practice be unworkable in the international arena, because Gibraltar is not part of the British State and its only status under international law is that of a territory awaiting decolonisation in a process supervised by the United Nations.At the same time, Brexit has opened a window of opportunity for resolving this historical dispute, which encompasses both peaceful coexistence between Spain and the small neighbouring community of Gibraltar just over the border, and the question of sovereignty that underlies the dispute with the United Kingdom. The acting Spanish Government took two important decisions in 2016: it announced the need to negotiate the status of Gibraltar outside the framework of TEU Art. 50, and it proposed joint sovereignty. This historic moment requires strategic decisions supported by broad domestic consensus in Spain, since it is a key issue strongly symbolic of Spanish foreign policy which may have important domestic and international consequences. Spain now has the opportunity to adopt a strategic approach that incorporates a new narrative and focus for Gibraltar, and which addresses the pending issue of regulating cross-border relations and coexistence with the people of Gibraltar. The unanimous support given in 2016 by all political parties for a European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation (EGTC) with Gibraltar within the EU framework demonstrates that significant changes are possible for cross-border coexistence. Gibraltar and Campo could even adopt a common approach to Brexit and its consequences for Gibraltar and the region, enforcing this in their respective States and the EU as negotiations begin.The format and content of the joint sovereignty proposal announced by Spain is the same as that of others presented or negotiated previously. But the 2016 Spanish proposal of Joint Sovereignty has structural deficiencies, which make it unworkable in practice. Several objective questions can be raised: UK and Gibraltar have yet rejected this proposal; it was made unilaterally by the conservative Government of M. Rajoy, without looking for previous supporting consensus inside Spain; and the most practical problem which is that the proposal inextricably links cross-border cooperation with the resolution of the sovereignty dispute, this creates an impasse given that both the UK and Gibraltar have already rejected joint sovereignty.Instead of Joint Sovereignty negotiations as the answer for the Gibraltar question, the article advocate a twofold approach in the current historical negotiating situation for the UK's departure from the EU: a provisional Modus Vivendi for cross-border coexistence, and in parallel an agreement to seek a new international and European model for Gibraltar, trying to put an end to historical controversy.A provisional Modus Vivendi for the cross-border coexistence with Gibraltar could be an interim agreement to regulate the aspects that most urgently need the daily normalization. Especially the border crossing by the Border/Fence, but also others such as the issues of transparency and economic-financial collaboration, navigation and jurisdiction over Bay waters, or the use of the airport.This historic moment could be conducive to moving forwards in new and imaginative ways, with initiatives such as that of 'symbolic sovereignty' formula via the proposed Principality of Gibraltar or City of the British and Spanish Crowns linked to the EU, which offers sufficient constitutional and international margins for consideration. This proposal of the Two Crowns Principality, linked to the EU, would restore Gibraltar to the Spanish nation and sovereignty, in addition to incorporating it into the EU as part of the Kingdom of Spain, ensuring the maintenance of its current organisation and powers and entailing agreements on Gibraltar's economic and financial regime and British retention of its military bases.

In this article the author analyses specific reservations that are being done to the international documents for the protection of human rights and whether Vienna Convention on the Law of the Treaties applies to those human rights treaties or not. Also, the author analyses if reservations, which are incompatible with object and purpose of the treaty, can be done or not and what consequences they might bring. For this reason the author describes the practice of the state members under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. These treaties were chosen not only because they laid down the most significant principles of the protection of human rights, but also due to the great number of reservations made to the fundamental provisions of these treaties. The importance of the topic is that in the human rights treaties the implementation of Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties provisions on reservations brings several issues, even though on theoretical level the regulation of reservations seems unproblematic. Firstly, there is a major group of states (especially Islamic countries, which base their explanation on the incompatibility with Islamic law), which want to become parties to the treaties that protect human rights and make reservations to fundamental provisions of them at the same time. Secondly, the state parties that make objections to the reservations have to decide if the reservation is compatible with the object and purpose of the treaty or not. The regulation that is laid down in Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties creates difficulties for the state parties and withdrawal of reservations seems to be more problematic in reality than it is in theory. In order to find the solutions for the above mentioned issues, the author analyses whether the Vienna Convention on the Law of the Treaties regime works properly within the mechanism of making reservations to the human rights treaties or not, what reservations should be kept invalid under the human rights treaties and what could be the solutions for the most effective protection from the invalid reservations that address fundamental rights of human beings in the human rights law. ; https://repository.mruni.eu/handle/007/10704

More than four years after the 1999 Agreement on Adaptation of the 1990 Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE Treaty) was signed, the conventional arms control process in Europe remains deadlocked. The main sticking point continues to be Russia's non-compliance with the commitments it made at the 1999 Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Istanbul Summit, particularly those regarding the withdrawal of Russian military forces from Georgia and Moldova. The second wave of NATO enlargement caused Russia to intensify its diplomatic and political rhetoric in 2003 and early 2004, alleging that enlargement would deal a 'fatal blow' to the European conventional arms control regime. The resulting confrontation has made both NATO and Russia aware of the need to find a means to deal with the problem. In 2003 the OSCE participating states remained focused on improving certain norm- and standard-setting measures (NSSMs) and developing new ones in order to better respond to the various threats and challenges facing Europe and its perimeter. In 2003 a Handbook of Best Practices on Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) was published to assist participating states in implementing the 2000 OSCE SALW Document. A great deal of work was also done to promote the 1994 Code of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspects of Security (COC) in the states of Central Asia and the Caucasus and in other former Soviet states. The OSCE's efforts to combat terrorism led the participating states to propose new arms control-related initiatives. Most significantly, at the OSCE Maastricht Ministerial Council, the OSCE Document on Stockpiles of Conventional Ammunition was adopted, setting out a process whereby requesting states would receive assistance with the destruction of their surplus ammunition. The Treaty on Open Skies had a smooth second year of implementation. Three states ratified the treaty in 2003, and several others are in the process of doing so. In the Balkans, regional arms control continues to work well, evidently unaffected by political, economic and other factors in the region. Although the European conventional arms control regime is by far the most advanced of its type in the world, significant progress is being made in other regions. Within the framework of the Organization of American States (OAS), headway was made in 2003 in elaborating the confidence -- and security -- building measures (CSBMs) process in the western hemisphere. A Meeting of Experts on CSBMs took place in Miami, Florida, which built on earlier meetings organized during the 1990s. Recommendations were made on voluntary CSBMs dealing with both traditional and new security threats. At the November Meeting of States Parties to the 1981 Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons which may be deemed to be Excessively Injurious or to have Indiscriminate Effects (CCW Convention), Protocol V on Explosive Remnants of War (ERW) was adopted. Among other things, the protocol commits signatories to clear or assist in the clearance of ERW following armed conflicts. The protocol was opened for signature and ratification. The attention given to restricting the use of anti-vehicle mines demonstrates the willingness of states to mitigate the consequences of the use of weapons that predominantly affect civilians. Adapted from the source document.

Abstract
In recent years, there has been mounting interest in the possibility of the Paris Agreement 2015 featuring in investor-State arbitration.2 This applies particularly to investments connected to greenhouse gas emissions mitigation, insured emissions and other financial investments to be made under the internationally supervised emission-offsetting mechanism to be activated in accordance with the Glasgow Climate Pact 2021.3 While modernisation reforms to the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) are anticipated to include direct reference to the Paris Agreement, their effect has been thrown into doubt by recent withdrawals of EU Member States. Although the past two years have seen increasingly successful efforts to enforce the Paris Agreement before national courts, a disputing party has yet to invoke it in an investor-State arbitration. Whereas environmental exception clauses, direct references to the Paris Agreement and substantive obligations on environmental protection remain rare in international investment agreements, this situation is likely to change as 'green investment' expands and high-emission investors react to intensification of host State efforts to mitigate emissions. In analysing recent arbitral jurisprudence on the right of regulation, it is suggested that the most significant effect of the Paris Agreement on international investment law may be in defining the investment relationship of the disputing parties with respect to the liability of the host State for alleged breaches of the substantive protections for the investment under investment treaties, contracts and laws.

The newly inaugurated administration of President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. took immediate steps to reengage with a variety of international institutions and agreements from which the Trump administration had withdrawn. On January 20, 2021, the administration deposited with the United Nations a new instrument of acceptance of the Paris Agreement on climate change, and it halted U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization (WHO). On January 21, the United States announced that it would participate in the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) Facility, an international vaccine distribution scheme. The Biden administration also announced that it would reengage with and seek election to the UN Human Rights Council, and it quickly reached agreement with Russia for a five-year extension of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), the last remaining arms control agreement between the two countries. These early moves are consistent with the foreign policy strategy President Biden previewed during the campaign when he promised to "renew American leadership" and "[e]levate [d]iplomacy." In his first speech on foreign policy as president, delivered at the U.S. State Department on February 4, Biden asserted that "America is back" and that "[d]iplomacy is back at the center of our foreign policy." To implement these objectives, Biden has appointed a slate of experienced foreign affairs officials, many of whom worked in the Obama administration.

The national security strategy adopted in 2007 provided a detailed definition of security and identified its threats. The key threat to the Armenian state was considered to be the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The document indicated the Collective Security Treaty Organisation main guarantor of security, with Russia being Armenia's main partner in bilateral relations. The second position in the strategy was assigned to cooperation with the NATO and the OSCE. One of the priorities identified was to intensify the economic and trade connections with the European Union and participation in the European Neighbourhood Policy as a step towards integration with European structures. As to bilateral relations, the most significant were Armenia's contacts with Georgia and Iran. If we compare the assumptions of the strategy with the policy pursued by Armenia after 2007, it is clear that the measures taken are in line with the provisions of the document. By the end of 2016, the most serious threat to Armenia – the Nagorno-Karabakh issue – remained unresolved. Russia reinforced its position as Armenia's strategic ally. The talks conducted between Armenia and the NATO are of little significance in view of the obligations assumed by Armenia. The same goes for the talks with the European Union after Armenia's withdrawal from signing the association agreement, accession to the Eurasian Economic Union on 01 January 2015 and signing bilateral agreements with the Russian Federation.

В статье разбирается вопрос, чем руководствовались ведущие политики и военные Германской империи в оценке большевистского этапа Российской революции, и делается вывод о том, что на первом месте стояло стремление обеспечить выход России из первой мировой войны и более широком плане – ее исключение из числа великих держав. Страх германских правящих кругов перед «мировым большевизмом» был «продуктом для внутреннего потребления» и не оказывал заметного влияния на принятие стратегических решений во внешней политике. В свою очередь для советского правительства на первом месте стояли вопросы сохранения собственной власти внутри страны, сколько-нибудь заметной поддержки левых сил в Германии вплоть до осени 1918 г. оно не оказывало. ; The article deals with the question of what guided the leading politicians and military men of the German Empire in estimation of the Bolshevik stage of the Russian Revolution and concludes that the main desire was to ensure Russia's withdrawal from the First World War and more broadly its exclusion from among the great powers . The fear of the German ruling circles over "world Bolshevism" was a "product for domestic consumption" and did not have a noticeable influence on the adoption of strategic decisions in foreign policy. However for the Soviet government in the first place were the questions of preserving their own power within the country and that's why it didn't provide any noticeable support for the leftist forces in Germany until the autumn of 1918.

Cover -- Outline Contents -- Detailed Contents -- List of Boxes, Figures, Images and Tables -- List of Abbreviations -- Preface: The Fascination and Frustration of Studying a Key Institution -- Part I: The European Council: Overview and History -- 1 Introduction: The Many Faces of the European Council -- In the spotlight -- A look at the legal texts: some basic institutional features -- The real world: activities, agreements and acts -- Shifting the institutional balance: trends in the EU's architecture -- Inside the European Council: the puzzle of consensus formation -- Conclusion: puzzles for a hybrid institution -- 2 Multiple Approaches for Understanding a Contested Institution Three Models -- The presidency model: at the top of the institutional hierarchy -- The council model: towards communitarisation -- The fusion model: the European Council as the dominant multilevel player -- Conclusion: a lively debate -- 3 Pre-History: The Birth of Institutionalised Summitry -- Historical perspectives: from a long-term perspective towards a close-up view -- Emergence: reasons for institutionalised summitry -- Establishment: the making of a new institution -- Conclusion: an enabling compromise -- 4 History: Generations of Leaders and the Institutional Trajectory -- Five generations of leaders -- The institutional trajectory of the European Council: incremental evolution to full treaty status -- Conclusion: patterns of continuity -- Part II: The Role of the European Council within the EU Architecture -- 5 Political and Procedural Leadership: General Functions and Specific Powers -- Functions in the EU's policy cycle -- Elective functions: the power as an electoral body -- Institutional and procedural arrangements: the power of incremental engineering -- Procedures for suspension and withdrawal: the power of exclusion.

The USA considers missile potentials of Russia, China, Iran and North Korea as the main sources of threats to their national security. In the early 2000s following the withdrawal from the Soviet-American ABM Treaty the US began to deploy a global ballistic missile defense system to protect their "homeland, US forces abroad and its allies" from potential and real threats. The set of basic elements of a multi-layer ballistic missile defense is generally the same, its architecture is always adapted to the local conditions of the regions of deployment and specific tasks. Their common designation is the ability to work as subsystems within an integrated, global in scope antiballistic missile defense system controlled by the United States. In the Asia-Pacific region, the United States is actively engaging its regional allies Australia, South Korea and Japan in a joint effort to build-up ABM capabilities while simultaneously increasing its military-strategic presence in the region. Moscow strongly opposes the program considering it as potential threat to the effectiveness of the Russian strategic nuclear forces and undermining strategic stability and considers emergence the ballistic missile subsystems in Europe and the Asian-Pacific Region as a direct threat to its security. US ABM policy provokes the accelerated development by China and the DPRK of ballistic missile delivery systems, encourages Russia to create new weapon systems that are guaranteed to be able to overcome any existing and future missile defense.

Treaty law and its relationship with the legal system of the European Union are the subjects of this article, which analyses them in the light of Brexit and the agreements - simple withdrawal agreement and mixed agreement on future relations - that will govern the exit of the United Kingdom. In particular, it analyses the binding nature of such agreements for the Union and for its Member States, with special reference to Spain, their hierarchy in the system of sources and the possible direct effect of their obligations. The article also seeks to explore how principles applicable to these problems would be relevant to other agreements concluded by the Union and its Member States: international administrative agreements and non-normative agreements. ; El Derecho de los tratados y sus relaciones con el ordenamiento jurídico de la Unión Europea son los temas de este artículo, que los analiza a la luz del Brexit y de los acuerdos -acuerdo simple de retirada y mixto de relaciones futuras- que regirán la salida del Reino Unido. Se analiza en particular la obligatoriedad de tales acuerdos para la Unión y para los Estados que la componen, con especial referencia a España, su jerarquía en el sistema de fuentes y el posible efecto directo de sus obligaciones. El artículo pretende también estudiar cómo principios aplicables a esos problemas resultarían relevantes para otros acuerdos que celebra la Unión y sus Estados miembros: los acuerdos internacionales administrativos y los acuerdos no normativos.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia was reduced from the role of a global hegemon to that of a regional hegemon. As the regional hegemon, Russia was responsible for creating a regional order that was nested within the global order. However, since the Soviet Union had collapsed, it could not be assumed that Russia would create a regional order that was compatible with the global order. Would Russia create a regional order that was incompatible with the global order, and further, would Russia be a dissatisfied state that would challenge US hegemony? Using network analysis, I discover that Russia created a regional order that was compatible with the global order. In other words, Russia did not directly challenge the global order. More specifically, Russia accepted the global order that existed at the end of the Cold War. Providing that the global order remained static, Russia would not challenge that order. However, US actions following the collapse of the Soviet Union such as the expansion ofnatoand the withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty are interpreted by Russia as a dynamic change in the global order. The Ukrainian crisis further exacerbated the wedge that had developed between the United States and Russia. It has further isolated Russia, destroyed the regional order nested within the global order, and ensured that Russia fully became a dissatisfied state looking to challenge US hegemony. Russia will now turn to China to try to challenge US hegemony.

The article argues that consequence of Brexit bring specifi c costs for both of the partners: EU as well as the United Kingdom. Nevertheless, the procedure of Brexit brings about also some positive aspects. The procedure itself points at the fact how European integration is important for the economy and development of each member state. The procedure helps to restructure the future Multiannual Financial Framework after 2020, it also shows that it is easier to negotiate conditions of trade being represented by the Commission than doing it individually in relations between two states. Separate problem is ascribed to deterrence of applying similar ideas in states, which had followed some of the Brexit visions and mobilized by them politically some of the citizens (Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Germany, Hungary, Italy and Poland). All such conclusions can be drawn while discussing the process, which prolongs and it is impossible to guess how fi nally it will end for the UK as well for the EU as far as their mutual economic relations are concerned. It is still possible to withdraw from the article 50 of the treaty, it is possible to accept the negotiated conditions of the withdrawal treaty or to leave the EU without an agreement. Still all mentioned solutions are possible and can be applied. The choice of one of them is a big unknown. Lack of the Brexit agreement will cause big costs for both of the partners: the EU and the UK. ; Artykuł ma na celu dowieść, że skutki brexitu niosą określone koszty zarówno dla UE, jak i Wielkiej Brytanii. Sama procedura brexitu wskazuje znaczenie integracji europejskiej dla rozwoju każdego z państw UE, która wspomaga proces restrukturyzacji przyszłych Wieloletnich Ram Finansowych, wskazuje, że łatwiej jest negocjować warunki handlu, mając za reprezentanta Komisję, niż na zasadzie indywidualnej – państwo z państwem. Osobny problem wiąże się z działaniem na rzecz odstraszania od podobnych koncepcji państw, w których naśladownictwo "brexitu" stało się tematem mobilizującym politycznie (Dania, Finlandia, Francja, Grecja, Niemcy, Polska, Węgry, Włochy). Brexit się przeciąga, jednak trudno przewidzieć, jak się zakończy dla UE i Wielkiej Brytanii, jeśli chodzi o przyszłe wzajemne relacje. Nadal możliwe jest cofnięcie decyzji o uruchomieniu artykułu 50 traktatu, czy zaakceptowanie wynegocjowanej umowy lub wyjście bez umowy, co oznaczałoby bardzo duże koszty dla obu stron.