Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T17:26:35.196Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Air Law Group

The Hague Convention on Hijacking of Aircraft 1970 : The legal aspects

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 July 2016

Bin Cheng
Bin Cheng*
Affiliation:
University College, London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft—to give the treaty its official title—was drafted by a subcommittee of the Legal Committee of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) in September/October 1969, considered by the Legal Committee itself in February/March 1970, signed at a diplomatic conference meeting at The Hague on 16th December 1970, and came into force on 14th October 1971 amongst those States that had ratified it. While the coming into being of the Hague Convention has been fairly expeditious, so far only 15 States (Bulgaria, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Gabon, Hungary, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Mali, Niger, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, USA, USSR) have accepted it. It is to be hoped that the United Kingdom, which took a leading part in developing this Convention, will do so before long, especially as the necessary legis-lation has already been passed—the Hijacking-Act which received the Royal Assent on 5th August 1971.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Aeronautical Journal , Volume 76 , Issue 741 , September 1972 , pp. 529 - 535
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Aeronautical Society 1972 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1.ICAO Doc. 8838-LC/157.Google Scholar
2.Montreal Draft, ICAO Doc. 8877-LC/161.Google Scholar
3.Pari Deb, House of Commons, Weekly Hansard, No 866, col 853, 2nd July 1971.Google Scholar
4.Federal Aviation Act 1958, as amended, P.L.S7-197, 75 Stat 466 (1961); 49 U.S.C. § 1472 (i); see further Alona E. Evans, Aircraft hijacking; its cause and cure, 63 American Journal of International Law (1969), p. 695. The United States delegate to the 1963 Tokyo Conference recognised: “The legislation of his country provided for acts of piracy on the high seas, but these acts to which he was referring (hijacking of aircraft) did not come under the Convention on the High Seas and, consequently, did not constitute piracy within the meaning given to that expression by the law at the present time” (ICAO Doc 8302-LC/150-1, p. 149).Google Scholar
4a. UK Treaty Series No 5 (1963), Cmnd. 1929. Italicisation added.Google Scholar
5. cf. Shubber, Sami. Is hijacking of aircraft piracy in international law? 43 British Year Book of International Law (1968-9), p. 193.Google Scholar
5a. Convention on Offences and certain other Acts committed on Board Aircraft, Tokyo, 14th September 1963, UK Treaty Series No 126 (1969), Cmnd. 4230. See further Sir Richard Wilberforce, Crime in Aircraft, Journal of the Royal Aeronautical Society, vol 67, pp 175–183 (1963).Google Scholar
6. The Times, p. 1, col 1, 12th July 1971.Google Scholar
7. The Times, p. 1, cols 2-4, 27th May 1971; p. 8, cols 3-6, 28th May 1971; The Sunday Times, p. 6, col 8, 30th May 1971; The Times, p. 7, col 3, 30th September 1971; p. 8, col 7, 6th October 1971; p. 7 col 3, 8th October 1971; p. 9, col 1, 28th January 1972. At the Hague Conference, the United Kingdom gave its support to a proposal put forward by the International Law Association to continue to restrict the scope of the Convention to “aircraft in flight”, but otherwise to extend its scope to include all offenders, wherever they may be (SA Doc No 19). This, as well as a somewhat similar Netherlands proposal, was not accepted by the Conference.Google Scholar
8. cf. Observer from the International Law Association, 5th December 1970, morning session, para 42 of the minutes of the session. The reason why his suggestion was not accepted may be attributed to the fact that his suggestion did not specify that this test was to be applied outside the State of registration of the aircraft.Google Scholar
9. See Section 1(3) of the Act on why Article 7 of the Convention by itself is virtually meaningless, especially in this context, see below 4.2 in medio. Google Scholar
10.This interpretation is supported by Article 4(3) of the complementary Montreal Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against the Safety of Civil Aviation of 23rd September 1971. In a similar provision, the whole convention is made to apply.Google Scholar
11.[1955] 1QB 540.Google Scholar
12.SA Doc No 72 and 72 Rev.Google Scholar
13.SA Doc No 19. *See further International Law Association, Report of the fifty-fourth Conference, The Hague (1970), p. 285 et seq, 1971.Google Scholar
13a. See 3 above, Scope of the Convention.Google Scholar
14.SA Doc No 32.Google Scholar
15.SA Doc No 28.Google Scholar
16. See Keesing's Contemporary Archives, p. 24209, 24th September-3rd October 1970. cf. also The Times, p. 2, cols 4-5, 22nd October 1970.Google Scholar