1. As of 1 November 1994, 46 of the 127 States parties to the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights had, between them, entered 150 reservations of
varying significance to their acceptance of the obligations of the Covenant. Some of
these reservations exclude the duty to provide and guarantee particular rights in the
Covenant. Others are couched in more general terms, often directed to ensuring the
continued paramountcy of certain domestic legal provisions. Still others are directed
at the competence of the Committee. The number of reservations, their content and
their scope may undermine the effective implementation of the Covenant and tend to
weaken respect for the obligations of States parties. It is important for States parties
to know exactly what obligations they, and other States parties, have in fact
undertaken. And the Committee, in the performance of its duties under either article
40 of the Covenant or under the Optional Protocols, must know whether a State is
bound by a particular obligation or to what extent. This will require a determination
as to whether a unilateral statement is a reservation or an interpretative declaration
and a determination of its acceptability and effects.
2. For these reasons the Committee has deemed it useful to address in a general
comment the issues of international law and human rights policy that arise. The
general comment identifies the principles of international law that apply to the making
of reservations and by reference to which their acceptability is to be tested and their
purport to be interpreted. It addresses the role of States parties in relation to the
reservations of others. It further addresses the role of the Committee itself in relation
to reservations. And it makes certain recommendations to present States parties for a
reviewing of reservations and to those States that are not yet parties about legal and
human rights policy considerations to be borne in mind should they consider ratifying
or acceding with particular reservations.
3. It is not always easy to distinguish a reservation from a declaration as to a
State’s understanding of the interpretation of a provision, or from a statement of
policy. Regard will be had to the intention of the State, rather than the form of the
instrument. If a statement, irrespective of its name or title, purports to exclude or
modify the legal effect of a treaty in its application to the State, it constitutes a
reservation Conversely, if a so-called reservation merely offers a State’s understanding of a provision but does not exclude or modify that provision in its application to that State, it is, in reality, not a reservation.