E/2009/43 E/C.19/2009/14 11. The voting of the General Assembly, which proves that a great majority of the international community stands behind the Declaration, is a significant factor when determining the legal strength of the Declaration. Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice, stating the sources of international law that the Court shall apply, includes among them “the general principles of law recognized by civilized nations”. The Declaration is formulated on “principles of law”, having “rights” as the main concept, and the worldwide adherence to the Declaration, with the small and shrinking group of negative States, may soon be considered as a fulfilment of the criterion of the “civilized nations”. 12. The combined effect of these elements gives the Declaration a growing legal status. It might be argued that the Declaration in its entirety already has acquired the status of being part of binding international law. In any way, this is the case already for a number of the articles. 13. The understanding of the Declaration here described shall form the basis on which the Forum is going to undertake its activities. The Forum has already included an item on the Declaration on its agenda. The effect of article 42 14. This new function assigned to the Forum pursuant to article 42 is far-reaching. The formulas of the provision are of a twofold nature. 15. In the first place, the Forum shall promote not only respect for but also “full application” of the Declaration. This implies that the Forum shall work to promote the incorporation of the Declaration into national legislation as well as its application in the national courts and administrative decisions of the various countries. 16. Second, the Forum shall follow up “the effectiveness” of the Declaration, that is, to see whether the realities (“law in action”) are in conformity with the written law and decisions (“law in books”), and if not, take necessary actions to close the implementation gap. 17. This new and extensive responsibility does not, in the wording of the article, correspond with any authority to accomplish what is required in this regard. The authority of the Forum will accordingly have to be decided by way of a reading of article 42 on the basis of the Declaration as a whole. In this process of interpretation one has to rely on some principles or guidelines that are within the spirit of the Declaration. 18. Some accepted guidelines for interpretation will in this case be the workings of the Forum so far, the purpose of article 42 and the normal way of protecting human rights within the United Nations system. 19. The present working arrangement of the Forum has to be a starting point for the reading of the new article. The purpose of article 42 is to contribute to the effectiveness of the Declaration, and the reading of the Article should therefore give preference to working methods for the Forum that are oriented towards substantial results for the indigenous peoples as rights holders. Looking to the normal way of protecting human rights within the United Nations system will also find support in the wording of the article, where the Forum is placed on a par with other bodies of the United Nations. 09-36351 21