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Show -117- 10. The parties shall have a month to state whether they accept the conciliatory award or not. In the latter case and at the request of the interested parties the disagreement shall then be submitted to arbitration, the respective tribunal being constituted by the procedure provided in the Second Hague Convention for the peaceful solution of international conflicts. "The Court, whose function is to decide in accordance with international law such disputes as are submitted to it, shall apply; ... (c) the general principles of law recognized by civilized nations" In numerous cases international courts have referred to general principles of law as a source of international law and have invoked them as a basis for their decisions . The consistent pattern of the practice of states in entering into agreements concerning uses of systems of international waters may itself be regarded as recognition of the existence of general principles of law in that regard. Thus the ECE Report2, while conceding that treaties "do not necessarily express a national principle or reflect customary practice1 , states that: Nevertheless, the examination of these conventions is of value insofar as it provides a clue to the conception of international law held by nations generally. If, in fact, the same problem is resolved in the same way in a large number of agreements, it may be concluded that that solution is in line with the principles generally recognized by civilized States. In 1862 the Netherlands Government stated in a letter to its ministers in London and Paris that The Meuse being a river common both to Holland and to Belgium, it goes without saying that both parties are entitled to make the natural use of the stream, but at the same time, following general principles of law, each is bound to abstain from any action which might cause damage to the Professor Sauser-Hall, after reviewing the domestic law of the United States, Switzerland, Italy, Germany and France, concludes that a generally recognized principle is: 'no diversion of a stream which is 1. The cases are collected in Cheng, Gen. Prins. of Law as Applied by Int. Cts. and Tribs. (1953) 2. pp.20^5. 3. Smith, p. 217 |
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Original book: [State of Arizona, complainant v. State of California, Palo Verde Irrigation District, Coachella Valley County Water District, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, City of Los Angeles, California, City of San Diego, California, and County of San Diego, California, defendants, United States of America, State of Nevada, State of New Mexico, State of Utah, interveners] : |