| Summary/Abstract |
Under the customary international law on the interpretation of treaties as reflected in Articles 31-32 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, the travaux préparatoires of a treaty may be resorted to in order to confirm the meaning resulting from the application of the general rule in Article 31, to remove an ambiguity, or to cure a manifestly absurd or unreasonable result. The International Court of Justice divined a fourth use of travaux préparatoires—to prove the non-preclusion of an interpretation—in the LaGrand case. This use provides some additional comfort to the interpreter of a treaty provision that the interpretation reached through an exercise under Article 31 is not negatively affected by the travaux or is not definitely wrong. This use has also been extended by the Court to the use of context as well as text in treaty interpretation.
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