In June 2022, the International Labour Organization (ILO) decided to amend the 1998 Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work in order to include the right to a safe and healthy working environment among the core labour rights to which member States are committed by virtue of their membership. The amendment marks the successful completion of three years of negotiations initiated in response to the 2019 Centenary Declaration by which the ILO's tripartite constituency recognized that safe and healthy working conditions were fundamental to decent work. Adding occupational safety and health as a fifth pillar to the 1998 Declaration was generally welcomed as a commendable development although critics may still assert that as a soft law instrument the amended Declaration may not have decisive impact on workplace safety and health globally. Despite broad agreement about the timeliness and importance of recognizing occupational safety and health as a fundamental workers’ right—especially in light of the pandemic experience—concerns were raised about the possible implications of the amended Declaration on existing trade agreements, and in particular whether it would create, directly or indirectly, new obligations for member States. This article looks into the origins and negotiating history of the amendment to the 1998 Declaration and addresses the scope and legal effect of a saving clause by which the Conference sought to ensure that the amended Declaration would not impact obligations and commitments of States set out in labour provisions of free trade agreements currently in force and would not be subject to dynamic interpretation in the context of a trade dispute.

On June 14, 1993, just one year after an arbitral tribunal fixed the maritime boundary around the small French islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, off Canada's Newfoundland, the International Court of Justice rendered its judgment on a closely analogous case concerning anew a relatively small insular feature lying opposite a much lengthier continental coast. A marked disparity in coastal fronts once more controlled the geographical context, so that proportionality was elevated by one of the parties to a dominant legal presumption. Yet again, equidistance crossed swords with equity, but hopefully suffered little from the Court's familiar ‘shadowboxing’ against Article 6 of the 1958 Continental Shelf Convention. One of the root causes of the dispute, the capelin fishing ground (capelin is a migratory species abundant in the areas between Jan Mayen, Iceland and Greenland), was shared out in equal halves, the judgment sending strong echoes of distributive justice in this respect. As for the boundary line, the Court evinced afresh its inventiveness with a view to equally apportioning satisfaction. The judgment marks a most-welcome rapprochement of Article 6 and equitable principles discourse, an affirmed restoration of equidistance, and a victory for often victimized small islands. Proportionality, as a test of the equitability of the solution, was ignored and seems now to have completed its life cycle. The Court's decision also amounted to what may be termed a premiere. Indeed, this is the first maritime delimitation case heard by the Court on the basis of a unilateral application relying on declarations under Article 36 paragraph 2 of the Statute.