In Montevideo, on 26 December 1933, during the Seventh International Conference of American States, the Convention on the Rights and Duties of States is signed. The text, in Spanish, English, Portuguese and French, has sixteen articles.

Article 1 provides that the state as a person of international law should possess the following qualifications: a permanent population; a defined territory; government; and capacity to enter into relations with the other states. Article 2 provides that the federal state shall constitute a sole person in the eyes of international law.

Article 3 affirms that the political existence of the state is independent of recognition by the other states. Even before recognition the state has the right to defend its integrity and independence, to provide for its conservation and prosperity, and consequently to organize itself as it sees fit, to legislate upon its interests, administer its services, and to define the jurisdiction and competence of its courts. The exercise of these rights has no other limitation than the exercise of the rights of other states according to international law. Article 4 proclaims that states are juridically equal, enjoy the same rights, and have equal capacity in their exercise; the rights of each one do not depend upon the power which it possesses to assure its exercise, but upon the simple fact of its existence as a person under international law. Article 5 adds that the fundamental rights of states are not susceptible of being affected in any manner whatsoever.

Article 6 provides that the recognition of a state merely signifies that the state which recognizes it accepts the personality of the other with all the rights and duties determined by international law; recognition is unconditional and irrevocable. Article 7 allows recognition to be express or tacit, the latter resulting from any act which implies the intention of recognizing the new state. Article 8 provides that no state has the right to intervene in the internal or external affairs of another.

Article 9 applies the jurisdiction of states, within the limits of national territory, to all the inhabitants; nationals and foreigners are under the same protection of the law and the national authorities, and foreigners may not claim rights other or more extensive than those of the nationals. Article 10 places the conservation of peace as the primary interest of states and requires that differences of any nature which arise between them be settled by recognized pacific methods.

Article 11 establishes as a precise obligation the duty not to recognize territorial acquisitions or special advantages obtained by force, whether by the employment of arms, by threatening diplomatic representations, or by any other effective coercive measure. The territory of a state is inviolable and may not be the object of military occupation nor of other measures of force imposed by another state directly or indirectly or for any motive whatever even temporarily. Article 12 leaves unaffected obligations previously entered into by virtue of international agreements.

Article 13 requires ratification in conformity with the respective constitutional procedures; the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Uruguay shall transmit authentic certified copies, and the instruments of ratification shall be deposited in the archives of the Pan American Union in Washington, such notification being considered as an exchange of ratifications. Article 14 provides that the Convention will enter into force between the High Contracting Parties in the order in which they deposit their respective ratifications. Article 15 keeps it in force indefinitely, subject to denunciation by one year's notice given to the Pan American Union; after that period the Convention shall cease in its effects as regards the denouncing party and remain in effect for the remaining Parties. Article 16 opens it to the adherence and accession of States which are not signatories. The United States signed with a reservation; Brazil and Peru recorded a private vote regarding Article 11. The text is not the 1948 Charter of the Organization of American States and not the Charter of the United Nations.

Image: Legislative Palace, Montevideo; GameOfLight, 16 August 2013; CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. Cropped to 16:9.

Source consulted: Montevideo Convention. Treaty text: Convention on the Rights and Duties of States, Montevideo, 26 December 1933.