264 



(4) The Organization shall inform the States which have signed or acceded 

 to the present Convention of any declaration under this Article as well as the 

 receipt of any instrument deposited in accordance with the provisions of para- 

 graph (2) of this Article. 



ARTICLE 16. — ENTRY INTO FORCE 



(1) The present Convention shall enter into force twelve months after the 

 date on which not less than [10] States the combined merchant fleets of which 

 constitute not less than [50] per cent of the gross tonnage of the world's merchant 

 shipping have become parties to it in accordance with Article 13. 



(2) An optional Annex shall enter into force twelve months after the date 

 on which the conditions stipulated in paragraph (1) of this Article have been 

 satisfied in relation to that Annex.°* 



(3) The Organization shall inform the States which have signed or acceded 

 to the present Convention of the date on which it enters into force and of the 

 date on which an optional Annex enters into force in accordance with para- 

 graph (2) of this Article. 



(4) For States which have deposited an instrument of ratification, acceptance, 

 approval or accession in respect of the present Convention or any optional 

 Annex after the requii'ements for the entry into force thereof have been met 

 but prior to the date of entry into force, the ratification, acceptance, approval 

 or accession shall take effect on the date of entry into force of the Convention 

 or such Annex or three months after the date of deposit of the instrument 

 whichever is the later date. 



(f)) After the date on which all the conditions required under Article 17 

 to bring an amendment to the present Convention or an optional Annex into 

 force have been fulfilled, any instrument of ratification or accession deposited 

 shall apply to the Convention or Annex as amended. 



ARTICLE 17. AMENDMENTS ^' 



( 1 ) The present Convention may be amended by any of the procedures specified 

 in paragraphs (2), (3) and (4) of this Article. 



(2) Amendment by unanimous acceptance : "' 



(a) Upon the request of a Contracting State, any amendment proposed by it to 

 the present Convention shall be communicated by the Organization to all Con- 

 tracting States for acceptance. 



5* One delegation suggested that all Annexes should enter Into force at the same time 

 Irrespective of whether certain States have declared that they do not accept certain 

 optional Annexes. 



5s As regards acceptance of amendments by States and as regards the effect of amend- 

 ments coming into force, some delegations— which on the first point were in favour of 

 a procedure of tacit acceptance confined to the technical Annexes alone, to the exclusion 

 of the Articles of the Convention and which on the second-point took the view that amend- 

 ments should only enter into force in respect of those States which had accepted them 

 either expressly or tacitly — opposed the concept of "amendment of an important nature", 

 which they considered to be contrary to the principles of the effect relative to treaties 

 and violated the sovereign rights of States. The argument advanced to justify the notion 

 of an important amendment — the need to have a uniform rule — does not achieve the 

 desired objective in that one of two States would be excluded from a Convention against 

 their wishes and, instead of being bound by all the provisions of that Convention (with 

 the exception of an amendment which a State does not accept), would be "expelled" from 

 the Convention whose application would thus be restricted. 



As concerns the body which would adopt amendments, these delegations opposed the 

 traditional system whereby the organs of IMCO — the Maritime Safety Committee and 

 the Assembly — adopt amendments. These delegations considered as inadequate and un- 

 satisfactory the procedure followe;! in the Convention for Safe Containers adopted in 

 Geneva in December 1972 : the '"enlarged" IMCO organs — composed, in addition to IMCO 

 Member States, of States Parties to a Convention having the richt to iiartlcipate in the 

 discussions and the right to vote (which, in some cases, would pose legal problems of 

 conijiatibility with the provisions of the IMCO Convention itself) — wo'ild not be suffi- 

 ciently representative or adeciuately qualified, since they would comprise a large number 

 of IMCO Member States which were not Parties to the Convention being amended. The 

 only satisfactory system which would conform to legal principles is that of a Revision 

 Commission, a body composed only of those States which are I'arties to the Convention in 

 question, and IMCO Member States which were not Parties would be excluded. In this 

 way. a Convention would only be amended by the States directly concerned and by them 

 .alone. In the view of these delegations, this is the sole effective means of diminishing the 

 imbalance which exists at present between the various stages whereby amendments are 

 adopted by the IMCO Member States and accepted solely by States Parties to a Convention. 



^Several delegations suggested that this paragraph "should be deleted as this procedure 

 has never been used. 



