The Rights of Land-Locked States Under the International Law: The Role of Bilateral/Multilateral Agreements

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982 provided rights for land-locked states on the sea. More importantly, the convention provided them with the right of access to and from the seas and freedom of transit. However, the law makes such rights subject to the agreements to be made by land-locked and transit states. This, in turn, depends on the prevailing relations between the concerned states. If they are not in a smooth relation, the transit states may not be willing to negotiate and thereby put impediments on the land-locked states’ free transit. The political will and commitment of transit states highly conditioned the rights of land-locked states. The denial of free transit, in turn, affects the rights of land-locked states on the different maritime regimes. Land-locked states have no absolute right of access to and from the seas and freedom of transit. Hence, the study concludes that to give practical effect to those rights, negotiating bilateral and multilateral agreements with the transit states has a crucial and irreplaceable role.