On December 1, 2022, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) rendered its judgment in the Dispute Concerning the Status and Use of the Waters of the Silala (Chile v. Bolivia). There is no basin agreement governing the Silala, and Chile and Bolivia have ratified neither the 1997 Convention on the Law of Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses nor the 1992 Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes. In the absence of a treaty regime applicable to the waters of the Silala River, the Court had the opportunity in this case to consider the legal framework applicable to international watercourses under customary international law.

On September 22, 2022, the Human Rights Committee (HRC) published its views in the communication of Daniel Billy et al. v. Australia, originally submitted in May 2019. Although not the first case before human rights treaty bodies on matters relevant to climate change, it is the first time the Human Rights Committee has found a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) in breach of its obligations under the ICCPR for failure to take mitigation and adaptation measures to combat the effects of climate change. In doing so, it made a number of comments on both procedural and substantive issues, which may well pave the way for future action.

The Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (the Framework) was adopted at the Fifteenth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) on December 19, 2022. Despite the efforts made under the CBD, biodiversity loss has continued at an alarming rate, and the targets set under the Convention's Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011–2020 were not fully achieved. In 2018, the CBD Parties therefore adopted a decision to develop a post-2020 global biodiversity framework to guide international efforts towards the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity over the next decade. The Framework, the adoption of which was delayed by two years by the COVID-19 pandemic, succeeds and replaces the 2011–2020 Strategic Plan for Biodiversity and its accompanying Aichi Targets. The Framework includes four overarching goals and twenty-three accompanying targets to be achieved by 2030, together with four long-term goals to achieve the 2050 Vision for Biodiversity.

The Artemis Accords (the Accords) reproduced below were signed on September 13, 2020, by the administrator of the U.S. space agency, NASA, and seven other space agencies. The intervening years since then have underscored their importance: they may give a boost to the development of the legal regime of outer space exploration and use as defined by the existing treaty framework, while supporting the U.S. interpretation of the non-appropriation principle, or they may upset the existing legal regime of Outer Space, leading to its fragmentation by abandoning multilateralism. This introductory note highlights those aspects of the Accords that may affect the edifice of the international law relating to Outer Space, even if the Accords themselves are not legally binding, as explained briefly below.

On September 15, 2022, the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (hereinafter ACERWC or Committee) issued its decision in the matter of Legal and Human Rights Centre and Centre for Reproductive Rights v. Tanzania. This case is related to the practice of forced pregnancy testing in schools in Tanzania and the later expulsion of girls who are found to be pregnant and/or married. The Communication was presented by the Legal and Human Rights Centre and the Centre for Reproductive Rights, on behalf of Tanzanian girls. This decision represents an important contribution to the line of international cases advancing the rights of girls under 18 years old, in particular in the areas of sexual and reproductive health and education, exemplified by increasing jurisprudence issued by regional human rights bodies.

On July 6, 2023, the CJEU issued this judgment concerning the Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air (the Montreal Convention), to which the EU is a party.