Normalisation Between Belgrade and Pristina: Binding Force and Legal Effects of the Brussels and Ohrid Agreements

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript represents a fresh and unique research angle, looking at a niche yet important legal issue concerning the legally binding nature of two bilateral instruments drawn up in the framework of the Belgrade-Pristina Dialogue, namely the 2013 Brussels Agreement (B.A.) and the 2023 Ohrid Agreement (O.A.). The scrutiny is carried out from the perspective of both international law and EU law.

For that, the author employs a pertinent and well-structured analytical frame; and pursues an original line of argumentation seeking to demonstrate: using “legally binding” as a single label is one dimensional and does not reveal all the nuances of various legal effects such instruments can produce, notably within the EU legal order. The author hits a number of relevant points and overall, he/she argues well. Still, the analytical depth of the piece can be improved here and there (see more specific comments in the attached reviewed manuscript). To this end, drawing on and critically engaging with more academic literature  - including the commentaries on the 1969 VCLT - would help deepen and corroborate the argument. Another general remark is to address and discuss more specifically the EU’s clearly stated claim on the legally binding nature of both the B.A. and the O.A. and the arguments used by the EU underpinning this characterisation. When touching upon the various legal effects of EU soft law, this component could be made more robust and developed further – to match the depth and density of the corresponding international law analysis conducted in light of relevant ICJ case law.

Please also make sure to break up long sentences for better and smoother readability; and double-check all references to case law for keeping with the required academic rigor across the board. Finally, make sure that there is always sufficient transition between sections.

For further, more specific and technical comments, see the attached document with PDF notes.

Summing it up, after duly addressing the aforementioned comments and those included in the reviewed manuscript, this reviewer recommends the publication of the article.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

We thank the Reviewer for the thoughtful and detailed feedback, including the detailed comments provided in the PDF file.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

Still, the analytical depth of the piece can be improved here and there (see more specific comments in the attached reviewed manuscript).

Response:

We have revised the manuscript to deepen the analytical framework and strengthen the doctrinal basis of the argument. Most notably, we clarified the problem statement and research question (pp. 3, ln. 69-74), expanded the literature framing by connecting the Belgrade-Pristina normalisation literature with scholarship on non-treaty instruments and EU soft law (p. 3, ln. 75-89), clarified the methodological distinction between ICJ-based assessment of binding force and EU-law assessment of legal effects (pp. 3-4, ln. 102-107). All changes in the manuscript have been marked.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

To this end, drawing on and critically engaging with more academic literature  - including the commentaries on the 1969 VCLT - would help deepen and corroborate the argument.

Response:

The Introduction now places the article more explicitly within the literature on treaties, political commitments and non-treaty instruments, as well as within the literature on EU soft law and legal effects (p. 2-3, ln. 69-97). The analytical framework has also been revised to discuss Article 3 VCLT and to clarify that falling outside the Convention’s scope does not, by itself, exclude possible legal force outside ordinary treaty form. To support this point, we added further doctrinal literature, including VCLT-related commentary and scholarship on non-treaty instruments and soft law (p. 4, ln. 110-120).

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

Another general remark is to address and discuss more specifically the EU’s clearly stated claim on the legally binding nature of both the B.A. and the O.A. and the arguments used by the EU underpinning this characterisation.

Response:

Thank you for this comment. The Introduction now discusses the EU’s treatment of the Brussels Agreement and previous Dialogue agreements as binding and relevant to the parties’ EU path, and also addresses the EU’s repeated claim that the Ohrid Agreement and its Implementation Annex are binding in their entirety under international law (p. 2, ln. 52-63). At the same time, the manuscript clarifies that the article does not simply adopt the EU’s characterisation as conclusive; instead, Test C explains the legal and institutional basis on which the EU can treat these arrangements as operative within the enlargement framework: accession benchmarks, progress reporting, monitoring mechanisms, conditionality and possible consequences for EU financial assistance (p. 12, ln. 524-532).

 

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

When touching upon the various legal effects of EU soft law, this component could be made more robust and developed further – to match the depth and density of the corresponding international law analysis conducted in light of relevant ICJ case law.

Response:

The revised framework now develops the legal-effects discussion through EU soft-law case law and literature (p. 6, 244-253; 262-265) and we also clarified the two-step operation of Test C (pp. 5, ln.205-219).

 

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

Please also make sure to break up long sentences for better and smoother readability; and double-check all references to case law for keeping with the required academic rigor across the board.

Finally, make sure that there is always sufficient transition between sections.

Response:

We have revised the manuscript for readability by breaking up long sentences where appropriate and improving the flow between sections. We have also checked the case-law references for accuracy and consistency, including the references to ICJ and CJEU case law. In addition, we strengthened the transitions between the Introduction and analytical framework (pp. 3-4, ln. 90-107), between the framework and the content/application sections, and in the Test C discussion (p. 15, ln. 512-520).

 

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

For further, more specific and technical comments, see the attached document with PDF notes.

Response: 

Thank you for the detailed technical comments in the annotated PDF. We have addressed the PDF comments throughout the revised manuscript, including by spelling out abbreviations at first mention, clarifying the research question and contribution, revising the section heading for the analytical framework, adding VCLT-related doctrinal discussion, clarifying the methodological use of ICJ case law, expanding the EU soft-law/legal-effects analysis, adding further CJEU case law, improving transitions, and revising several long or unclear sentences. All changes in the manuscript have been marked.

Three comments require brief clarification. First, regarding the comment, “Are all of these int’l treaties within the meaning of the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties?”, the reference to “more than 30 Dialogue agreements” is not intended to imply that all such instruments are international treaties within the meaning of Article 2(1)(a) VCLT. Rather, the phrase refers to technical and political agreements reached under EU facilitation before and after the Brussels and Ohrid Agreements. The revised text therefore avoids treating these instruments as treaties as such.

Second, regarding the comment, “Please ensure consistency by sticking to one terminology. So far, the two instruments have been referred to ‘agreements’ — why are they coined as ‘arrangements’ here?”, we have mostly standardised the terminology, but retained a distinction between “Agreement(s)” and “arrangement(s)” where analytically useful. “Agreement(s)” is used when referring to the Brussels Agreement and/or the Ohrid Agreement as named instruments. “Arrangement(s)” is retained only as a generic analytical category, especially where the precise legal form of the instrument is uncertain.

Third, regarding the suggestion to use “the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine”, we retained the phrase “the war in Ukraine” because the relevant sentence refers to the geopolitical effects of the war on the Belgrade–Pristina Dialogue, rather than to the legal characterisation of Russia’s conduct.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for the opportunity to review this article. I consider it suitable for publication, subject to the following revisions:
- Several paragraphs would benefit from rephrasing, starting with the abstract.

-Some of the concepts presented through abbreviations may not be sufficiently familiar to all readers.
- The literature review appears too limited. While references are included throughout the paper, the state of the art should be more clearly and systematically established.
- The research question should be explicitly outlined.
- I suggest integrating the notes currently placed in footnotes into the main body of the text where appropriate.
- The relationship between IICJ case law and the EU legal order should be addressed at some point in the paper.
- The content of the agreement could be presented before the discussion of the three tests; specifically, I suggest switching the order of Sections 2 and 3.
- The limitations of the research and potential avenues for future investigation should be clearly presented.

Author Response

We thank the Reviewer for the thoughtful and detailed feedback. Below, we address the comments point by point.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

Several paragraphs would benefit from rephrasing, starting with the abstract.

Response:

The manuscript has been revised for clarity and style throughout. The abstract has been substantially rephrased (p. 1, ln. 5-19), together with several other paragraphs throughout the text. All changes have been marked.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

Some of the concepts presented through abbreviations may not be sufficiently familiar to all readers.

Response:

The manuscript now explains abbreviations and technical terms where appropriate. For example, ICJ is spelled out in the abstract (p. 1, ln. 8), VCLT is introduced in the Introduction (pp. 1-2, ln. 39-40), EEAS is introduced at first use, and technical expressions such as animus contrahendi (p. 3, ln. 119-120) and unilateral seisin (p. 4, ln. 131-132) are clarified.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

The literature review appears too limited. While references are included throughout the paper, the state of the art should be more clearly and systematically established.

Response:

The manuscript addresses this issue in two places. First, the Introduction now provides clearer conceptual clarification and a more systematic account of the relevant state-of-the-art literature (pp. 2-3, ln. 75-88). Second, the analytical framework applies this distinction by separating the international-law assessment of binding force from the EU-law assessment of legal effects (p. 3, ln. 102-120).

 

Reviewer’s Comment:
The research question should be explicitly outlined.

Response:

The manuscript now explictly states the research question on p.2, ln. 71-74.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

I suggest integrating the notes currently placed in footnotes into the main body of the text where appropriate.

Response:

Several substantive footnotes have been integrated into the main text, while only technical clarifications have been retained as footnotes. For example, the discussion of the state of the art has been moved into the Introduction (pp. 2-3, ln. 75-88); the methodological clarification on Nicaragua v. Honduras and Peru v. Chile has been moved into the Test A discussion (p. 4, ln. 136-140); the caveat on the Court’s acquiescence jurisprudence is now included in the Test B discussion (p. 4, ln. 158-164); the explanation of acts à titre de souverain / authority-allocating conduct is now in the main text (p. 4, ln. 178-180); and the legal-effects disclaimer is now integrated into the opening of the Legal Effects section (p. 5, ln. 205 ff.).

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

The relationship between ICJ case law and the EU legal order should be addressed at some point in the paper.

Response:

Thank you. The revised manuscript now clarifies that ICJ case law is used only to identify indicators of intent, acceptance and reliance, while Test C asks a separate EU-law question (p. 3, ln. 102-107). This is further reinforced in the Legal Effects section, which explains that the article does not seek to resolve the broader EU law/international law relationship, but that Test C focuses on the narrower pre-accession question of EU-generated legal effects (p. 5, ln. 205-218).

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

The content of the agreement could be presented before the discussion of the three tests; specifically, I suggest switching the order of Sections 2 and 3.

Response: 

Thank you for this suggestion. We see the logic and value of presenting the content of the Agreements before the analytical framework. However, we retained the original structure for two reasons. First, beginning with the content of the Agreements could make the opening part of the manuscript appear primarily descriptive before the analytical distinction between binding force and legal effects is introduced. Second, the current structure “framework-content-application” provides a clearer flow than moving from content to framework and then back to application.To make this structure clearer, we revised the opening of Section 2 to explain the relationship between Tests A and B, which assess binding force under international law, and Test C, which assesses EU legal effects.

 

Reviewer’s Comment:

The limitations of the research and potential avenues for future investigation should be clearly presented.

Response: 

Thank you for this helpful suggestion. The conclusion already contained limitations and future-research paragraphs (original manuscript p. 13, ln. 541-559; revised manuscript pp. 14-15, ln. 650-680). These paragraphs have been retained, but proofread for clarity. They explain that the binding-force assessment is inherently time-sensitive and that future research should track how EU benchmark codification evolves across enlargement cycles and funding decisions, as well as how the parties’ conduct around contested obligations consolidates or fragments understandings of obligation.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This revised version is recommended for publication.

Only the qualification of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine is a point where this reviewer doesn’t agree with the authors. If it is a spade, let’s call it a spade. The international community and the EU itself have - rightly - qualified this war as “agression”. Therefore, this war should be referred to with the clear indication of the clear aggressor.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for the revised version of this paper, and I congratulate you for overall merit and contribution to the scholarship.