Legal Aspects of the French Nuclear Tests

Abstract
The question of the legality of France’s nuclear test series, commenced on July 2, 1966, in French Polynesia, will probably stop short of any definitive third-party determination and be subjected only to general community appraisal. Yet even at the level of scholarly or diplomatic argumentation it is important to inquire into the competing interests and legal factors involved in the atmospheric tests. This is true not only because differing political expectations or even measures might depend on the consensus as to the legality or illegality of the French tests, but also because the precedential value of the tests will be of greater or less force depending upon whether there is agreement at the time of the tests that France was or was not acting within her international legal rights.

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