1. Report of the Commision of 25 January in Yearbook of the European Convention of Human Rights, vol. 19, 1976, pp. 513-949, at 792-4.

2. Judgement of 18 January 1978 Ireland vs. United Kingdom, Publications European Court of Human Rights, Series A, vol. 25 (1978) at pp. 66-7.

3. Judgement of 17 October 1986 Rees Case, Publications Eoropean Court of Human Rights, Series A, vol. 106 (1987). The Commision's Report of 12 December 1984 is annexed to the judgement at p. 23.

4. J. de Maistre, Considèrations sur la France (1797), ed. P. Manent (Editions Complexe, Paris 1988), p. 87.

5. "Le Phènom"ne de la ìreconaissance Universelle"dans l"Experiènce Humaine" in Le Fondament des Droits de l"Homme: Actes des Entretiens de l"Aquila 14-19 septembre 1964 (La Nuova Italia, Florence, 1966), pp. 122-5 at p. 122.

6. "De la Liberté des Anciens Comparèe a celle des Modernes" in De la Liberté Chez les Moderns, pp. 491-515.

7. Ibid. at p. 501.

8. Ibid. at p. 506.

9. Ibid. at p. 495.

10. Ibid, at p. 502.

11. Ibid. at p. 502.

12. "Human Rights and Foreign Policy", address at University of Georgia School of Law, 30 April 1977, Department of State Bulletin, 23 May 1977, pp. 505ff.

13. It should be stressed that in his speech of 2 February 1990 President de Klerk emphatically stated that South Africa would live up to the general standards on human rights.

14. For the text, see Human Rights in International Law: basic texts (Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 1985), pp. 207-25.

15. "Islamic Universal Declaration of Human Rights" declared 19 September 1981 (UNESCO, Paris) by Mr Salem Azzam, Secretary General of the Islamic Council. For the text see Droits de l"Homme et droit des peuples, Fondation L. Basso pour de Droit et la Libèration des peuples (S. Marino, Ministero della Cultura, 1983), pp. 228-38.

16. The declaration is known as the "Draft Charter on Human and People's Rights in the Arab World" and is reproduced in Information Sheet No. 21 H/INF (87)1 (Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 1988), Appendix XXXX, pp. 243-61. This draft Charter represents the view of the participants of a Conference held in Syracuse, 5-12 December 1986; however it is based on a draft prepared by the General Administration for Legal Affairs of the Secretariat General of the League of Arab States.

17. It is worth mentioning in this respect the important statement made by President Gorbachev in Rome, on an official visit, on 30 November 1989. He repeatedly stressed the importance of "eternal moral values, the simple laws of ethics and humanity", which should 'serve as reference points" for the solution of the new tasks which the world is currently facing (p. 4 of the typewritten text of his statement, kindly provided by the Soviet Embassy in Rome; see also ibid. pp.7, 9, 18). He also stressed that "the increasing role of the principles common to all of mankind is not obliterating but rather enriching the originality and the role of national and other characteristics" (ibid., p. 5). Another important point made by Gorbachev is that states should strive to attain a "completely uniform (...) understanding and application of international law" (ibid., p. 16).