5.1 State actors

According to international law, only States (and sometimes regional economic integration organizations) are authorized to negotiate a multilateral treaty. Unless a State accepts, ratifies or otherwise accedes to an international agreement, it is not a Party to the agreement. All States, whether Parties or non-Parties are involved in the negotiations. However, only Parties can actually participate in the decision-making process. Observers may not vote or object to consensus proceedings. Groupings that are not recognized by the United Nations as States may only be involved as observers (e.g., Palestinian Liberation Organization). State actors and coalitions are discussed in the next section.

Table 3.
List of Parties and non-Parties as of September 7, 2000

Source: http://www.unfccc.int/resource/kpstats.pdf