BALTIC SEAENVIRONMENT PROCEEDINGS No. 59 - Helcom

facts and thus avoiding the long lasting and unnecessary “ritual square dances” which we experience
too often in other international fora.
And by the way it is also more difficult to be naughty to each other in a foreign language!
The written language we use in the Commission is known world wide as “Baltic English” and many
are the times when English speaking people have complimented our language for being exact and
easily readable, however with little variety. But what does that matter as long as those who read it
understand it.
Also a wise thing to decide was that the national contributions to the Commission should consist of
equal shares to avoid that any of the States would have more influence on the decision making due
to a larger contribution.
This was a wise decision at that time but it has certainly created some difficulties nowadays due to the
present economic situation in countries with economies in transition as well as in other countries
within the Region.
The creation of the Interim Commission was another splendid idea the work of which made it possible
for the Helsinki Commission to start its work immediately upon its establishment on 3 May 1980.
Achievements of the Helsinki Commission
The work of the Helsinki Commission has been characterized since its start on efforts aimed at
facilitating specialist co-operation and discussion across political divisions and a political discussion
has only been experienced once and it addressed the special Berlin after war status.
This political issue was soon solved and created no further problems for the work of the Commission.
As to the decision making by the Commission it has often been criticised that decisions had to be taken
in Recommendations to the Governments which were not legally binding and which had to be taken
in unanimity.
It was thus argued that the speed of the Commission thereby had to be adjusted to the speed of the
slowest ship in its convoy.
In a way this argument is to a certain extend correct but from experience we know that this, should
we say, more friendly procedure gave the less developed countries an incentive to go somewhat
further than originally planned while the more developed countries abstained from insisting on the
most stringent solution.
If one compare this procedure with the more strict procedures used in other comparable international
organizations one must conclude that the HELCOM procedure has in no way resulted in less results
for the marine environment and I would even say on the contrary .
This conclusion seems to be correct as the same decision making process will also be applied when
the 1992 Helsinki Convention enters into force.
When we look at the first years of the Commission’s life then the activities within the maritime and
combatting fields were given much attendance by the Commission sometimes to the frustration of the
scientific society which argued that at least the maritime matters could well be taken care of in the
global concept within IMO.