Legislation
Verdragenbank
The Treaty Database holds the data on treaties to which the Kingdom of the Netherlands is a party. Its content comes from Pacta, the internal treaty information system of the Treaties Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and is published through overheid.nl. Per treaty you find the date and place of conclusion, the date of entry into force, the location of the treaty text, the parties — states, territories and international organisations — the date of ratification, the applicability to the European Netherlands, Aruba, Curaçao, Sint Maarten and the Caribbean part of the Netherlands, and any reservations, declarations and objections. It is therefore not a text collection but a status register: the question you put to it is whether, since when and for which part of the Kingdom a treaty applies.
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What this source does not give you
The Treaty Database contains no treaty texts; it holds only the data and the references, and points to the Tractatenblad for the text itself. Reservations, declarations and objections are included insofar as they were made after 1 January 2003 — for treaties for which the Netherlands is depositary they are listed in full. And the database shows the register as it currently stands, with dates per action; there is no control that reconstructs the complete list of parties as it stood on a reference date of your choosing.
Frequently asked questions
- Does the Treaty Database contain the text of the treaty itself?
- No. The Treaty Database states explicitly that it contains no treaty texts: it holds the references and points to the relevant issue of the Tractatenblad. Official promulgation of a treaty text happens in the Tractatenblad; issues from 1951 onwards can be consulted in the official publications section of overheid.nl, and treaties from January 2005 are additionally held in consolidated form in the legislation database. In practice you use the Treaty Database to establish what to read and where, and the Tractatenblad to read it.
- How do I see whether a treaty is in force for the Netherlands?
- The Basic data tab of a treaty shows the fields Provisional application, In force, Retroactive effect and No longer in force side by side, together with the treaty number, the date and place of conclusion, and the references to the Tractatenblad, Staatsblad and act of approval. Below that sits a separate Kingdom of the Netherlands table with the data per constituent part, because a treaty may apply to the European Netherlands and not to Aruba, Curaçao, Sint Maarten or the Caribbean Netherlands. That split is the point most often overlooked.
- Are reservations and declarations included?
- Partly. The Treaty Database includes reservations, declarations and objections made after 1 January 2003. For treaties for which the Netherlands is depositary, all reservations and declarations are listed, including older ones. If you are looking for a pre-2003 reservation to a treaty with a foreign depositary, the database is not complete and you will need the Tractatenblad or the depositary itself.
- How current is the data?
- Data entered into Pacta at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs becomes available in the Treaty Database from 8.00 a.m. the following day. The database itself notes that some delay will always exist, because registration depends on notifications from depositaries. So for an action taken by another state last week the database may still be silent without anything being wrong.
- What sections does a treaty page have?
- A treaty is divided into the tabs Basic data, Parties, Amendments and Depositary. Basic data holds the treaty number, the date and place of conclusion, the operative dates, the Tractatenblad and Staatsblad references, the act of approval and a remarks field, with applicability per constituent part of the Kingdom below it. The Parties tab lists states, territories and international organisations with their actions, and Amendments records the relationships with other treaties. For a citable reference use the treaty number rather than the title: treaty titles are long and circulate in several variants.