Yehuda Z. Blum – författare

The first part of this book contains a selection of articles written over five decades. The second part includes a selection of legal opinions written between 1962-1965, when the author was working in the legal department of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. An appendix reproduces a letter on anti-Semitism at the United Nations, sent by the author in his capacity as Israel's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN and addressed to the UN Secretary-General. The author's varied career, as a leading academic and high-ranking diplomat, offers a unique perspective on many aspects of international law, ranging from constitutional problems of the UN Charter to the Arab-Israel conflict. The author has chosen to reproduce all these writings in their original form, while being acutely aware that significant changes have occurred in many fields of international law in the intervening period. This he has done consciously in the belief that preserving his writings unchanged will, not only indirectly, attest to the fundamental shifts in many areas of international law, not all of which meet with his approbation.

The question of Historic Titles in International Law has been much discussed in recent years. In particular, it was an issue of some im­ portance in several international arbitrations, such as the Gulf of Fon­ seca case, decided by the Central American Court of Justice; the Island of Palmas case, decided by Judge Huber as sole arbitrator, under the auspices of the Permanent Court of Arbitration; the case concerning the Legal Status rif Eastern Greenland before the Permanent Court of International Justice; and, more recently still, the cases concerning Fisheries (United Kingdom v. Norway); Minquiers and Ecrehos Islets (U nited Kingdom v. France) ; Certain Frontier Land (Belgium v. N ether­ lands); and Temple rif Preah Vihear (Cambodia v. Thailand), before the International Court of Justice. Historic Titles are probably also a re­ levant factor in a number of territorial disputes that have not yet been submitted to arbitration or judicial settlement. The recent controversies over the proper breadth for the territorial sea and the exclusive fishing limits of coastal States have brought to the fore new aspects of the problem.