Conference on Yugoslavia

The Arbitration Commission of the Conference on Yugoslavia (commonly known as Badinter Arbitration Committee) was a commission set up by the Council of Ministers of the European Economic Community on 27 August 1991 to provide the Conference on Yugoslavia with legal advice. Robert Badinter was appointed to President of the five-member Commission consisting of presidents of Constitutional Courts in the EEC. The Arbitration Commission has handed down fifteen opinions on "major legal questions" raised by the conflict between several republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY).

Between late 1991 and the middle of 1993, the Arbitration Commission handed down 15 opinions on legal issues arising from the fragmentation of Yugoslavia.

On 20 November 1991 Lord Carrington asked whether the secession of some republics from SFRY preserved its existence, as Serbia and Montenegro claimed, or caused its dissolution with all the republics being equal successors to the SFRY. The commission replied on 29 November 1991, "the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia is in the process of dissolution".

On 20 November 1991 Lord Carrington asked: "Does the Serbian population in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, as one of the constituent peoples of Yugoslavia, have the right to self-determination?" The commission concluded on 11 January 1992 "that the Serbian population in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia is entitled to all the rights concerned to minorities and ethnic groups.... Republics must afford the members of those minorities and ethnic groups all the human rights and fundamental freedoms recognized in international law, including, where appropriate, the right to choose their nationality". The opinion also extended the principle of uti possidetis to the former Yugoslavia for the first time.

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