Water Quality On The High Seas.

INTRODUCTION.

From the twenties is the fact that we are polluting the ocean faster than it can regenerate.

In the following I will discuss the history and development of treaties and conventions, from international law and international water regime have tried to minimize damage to the environment, analyze the current status of marine pollution in high seas and the conclusions will discuss any proposals to mitigate the damage to the environment.

All this emphasis on pollution done by oil spills by tankers, as I think it would be more appropriate to defend the regime from international waters.

HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT.

It was the beginning of the 20th century when it began to admit the existence of a problem of ocean pollution, produced mainly by oil spills. Proof is that there were some national rules trying to fix the problem in their territorial waters, but there were not any actions or conventions to avoid the problem in the international scene.

In the fifties, the amount of oil circulating in the ocean was so huge that was convened a conference, which left the first treaty for protecting the Sea , the OILPOL , which main objective was controlling pollution from tankers and for the discharge of oil and oily wastes.

The IMO , which is the principal international organisation concerned with vessel pollution issues, was established in 1958 , but, in the beginning , this organisation did not be involved in pollution prevention.

In 1958 too, result of the UN Conference on the Law of the sea , which was in Geneva, came the Convention on the High Seas, which included some rules about pollution. They were to draw up regulations to prevent pollution of the seas by the discharge of oil from ships or pipelines or resulting from the exploitation and exploration of the seabed and its subsoil , to take measures to prevent pollution of the seas from the dumping of radioactive waste and to cooperate with the competent international organizations in taking measures for the prevention of pollution of the seas or air space above, resulting from any activities with radioactive materials or other harmful agents .

It entered into force on 30 September 1962.

Major accidents at sea have produced concern and performance of the States at the international level, the IMO started to be involved in pollution prevention in this decade, due to the increase of oil spills; in 1967, the supertanker Torrey Canyon disaster led to a profound restructuring of international navigation rules, and it produced some conventions, like the CLC in 1969 or the London Convention in 1972.

The London Convention is very important in the area of the pollution of the Sea, its purpose is to promote the effective control of all sources of marine pollution and to take all possible measures to prevent marine pollution by dumping of wastes and other matter, and establishes a list of everything that can not be thrown into the sea. It entered into force since 1975, and actually it have 81 member countries. There was in 1996 a Protocol, which is an agreement that modernizes and updates the London Convention. In accordance with the Protocol, all discharges are prohibited, except for debris that may be acceptable, as reflected in the so-called "list of permitted discharges.", it entered into force in March 2006.

The MARPOL is the international legal instrument responsible for preventing marine pollution caused by ships either in the normal course of their economic or maritime accidents.

The first MARPOL, adopted on November 2, 1973, covered pollution by oil, chemicals, hazardous substances and wastes. The 1978 Protocol was adopted in February of that year in response to a series of accidents occurring between 1976 and 1977, and ended up absorbing the original written today so technically refers to the combination of both instruments with the name of International Convention for the Prevention of Marine Pollution from Ships, 1973 produced modified by the Protocol of 1978, it entered into force in 1982 October.

Since the first convention came into force have been carried out 20 amendments to the original text, to thereby update content and outdated due to technological advances and new cover unanticipated needs to be the same non-existent at the time drafting the Convention.

MARPOL has served as a framework for individual States when developing their own legislation on the protection of the marine environment and even today remains the international legal instrument par excellence in the field.

From the content of this Convention I will point that obliges parties to have reception facilities in their ports so that ships can be downloaded in such facilities

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