ABSTRACT
I would like to comment on what Dr. Petersmann has just said on the adoption of panel reports. He spoke about consensus as under the Law of the Sea Convention and I entirely agree that that would be a desirable procedure. However, he referred to "consensus minus two" because the parties should not be able to block, i.e., the loser should not be able to block the award. In that case it is consensus minus one unless of course there are more losers as is sometimes the case in questions where there may be three or four parties involved in a dispute. It is conceivable that three of them lose in which case it is consensus minus three. "Consensus minus two" suggests that the parties to the dispute will not be involved. That would be wrong. The parties to the dispute should take part in the decision except only that the loser cannot block a decision. The expression "consensus minus two" is misleading.
