Part II. European Law on Nationality and Statelessness a separate chapter on state succession. Why was a separate instrument necessary and would it not have been easier to just add a protocol to the ECN? As the ECN only contains general principles concerning statelessness in relation to state succession and, in light of “recent practical experiences” – likely to refer to the dissolution of the USSR, the SFRY and Czechoslovakia – the addition of “specific rules applicable to the particular situation of statelessness in relation to state succession” was deemed important.571 The idea, however, was at first to draft an additional protocol to the ECSS, or perhaps even a recommendation as a precursor to a protocol.572 CoE documents show that in 2002, the CJ-NA was given a mandate to develop an additional protocol to the ECN, which would further develop the provisions already present in the ECN.573 That the CoE in the end chose to draft a treaty was the result of considerations of a procedural nature. Any new states that come into existence should be able to accede to the ECSS immediately so that statelessness caused by state succession can be addressed effectively as soon as possible: “in order to allow as many States as possible to accede to this new instrument, including States which had not yet ratified the ECN, the Committee of Experts decided that the Protocol should be (technically) independent from the ECN”.574 If a state would have to accede to the more elaborate ECN first, this would take up much more time, which did not seem appropriate to the CoE.575 The attention to this specific issue within the CoE was not new, as the relation with the ECN already demonstrates. But as was mentioned above, in 1996, the CDL also adopted a Declaration on the Consequences of State Succession for the Nationality of Natural Persons. The ECSS is furthermore based on a number of other legal instruments. These include the legally binding 1961 Convention, and the ‘soft law’ instruments that are not legally binding: the ILC Draft Articles on Nationality of Natural Persons in relation to the Succession of States and the CM Recommendation on the Avoidance and Reduction of Statelessness, which is discussed further below. These instruments indeed are either not binding or are not specifically dealing with state succession. At the same time, this evidences how the CoE instrument is again an attempt to bring together rules, in this case on a very specific topic and situation, in one legally binding instrument. The ECSS’s structure is in some ways quite similar to that of the ECN, even though it does not include a chapter structure. After a preamble, the Treaty introduces a number of general provisions in Articles 1–4. These commence with definitions, 571 572 573 574 575 110 Ibid. Roland Schärer, ‘Statelessness in relation to State Succession: The Necessity of an Additional Instrument to the European Convention on Nationality’ in CoE, 2nd European Conference on Nationality “Challenges to National and International Law on Nationality at the Beginning of the New Millennium” (Strasbourg, 8 and 9 October 2001): Proceedings (CoE 2001) CONF/NAT (2001) PRO, 173–188, 188. PACE, ‘Draft Protocol on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession – Parliamentary Assembly Opinion No. 258’, 7 February 2006, GR-J(2006)3. The Opinion also considers the change of name of the instrument: from protocol to convention. Ibid. Roland Schärer, ‘The Council of Europe and the Reduction of Statelessness’ (2006) 25 Refugee Survey Quarterly 33, 38–39. Intersentia