How was the International Law Commission established?

The International Law Commission (ILC) is a subsidiary body of the General Assembly established to fulfill the General Assembly's mandate to ‘initiate studies and make recommendations for the purpose of encouraging the progressive development of international law and its codification’ as laid out by Article 13(1)(a) of the UN Charter.

It was established by A/RES/174 (II) of 21 November 1947. For information regarding the drafting of the statute of the ILC, contained in the General Assembly resolution, see the Audiovisual Library of International Law's historical archives entry on the Statute of the International Law Commission. 

The ILC, as a subsidiary body of the General Assembly, reports to the General Assembly on its work every year. This report is issued as a General Assembly document following the symbol pattern A/[session]/10. This pattern was established in the 31st session of the General Assembly (1976). Prior to that the reports have been issued under various UN Document symbols. The most recent sessional reports, can be found through a search through UNBISnet. For document symbols for past ILC sessional reports, see the following list of ILC sessional reports.

Working documents of the Commission are issued under series symbol A/CN.4/-

Press releases pertaining to the work of the Commission are issued under series symbol L/-

Further information, including current members, current topics of studies and links to valuable research tools, can be found on the website of the ILC.