42. The Court, for its part, cannot be satisfied with such publication as it does not have official value, and is not a "real time" reflection of the status of participation in the Protocol and in the system of the optional declaration. To date, the list of States Parties to the Protocol and that of the States Parties that have made the optional declaration, while being of primary interest to the Court, are not automatically notified to the Court by the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, depository of the Protocol. The Protocol does not oblige the depository to communicate declarations to the Court Registry, its Article 34 (7) contenting itself with providing that declarations should be deposited with the Chairperson of the African Union Commission "who shall transmit copies thereof to the State parties". The Statute of the International Court ofJustice22 and the American Convention of [sic] Human Rights23 , for their part, provide that the depositories of the optional declarations accepting the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice and the Inter-American Court, respectively, should file copies thereof in the Registries of the said courts. Although the relevant department of the African Union Commission is not legally bound to do so, it would also be desirable that in future the said department inform the Court of any update of the two above-mentioned lists. Fatsah Ouguergouz Aboubakar Diakité Registrar * Editor's note: Link accessed on 30/03/2012 at 4.00pm 1 On this point, see for example, Prosper Weil who notes as follows: "jurisdiction and seizure are not only distinct, conceptually; they are separate in time, normally, jurisdiction preceeds seizure [...]. In certain cases, however, the sequence may he reversed". [Translation by the Registry] "Compétence et saisine: un nouvel aspect du principe de la jurisdiction consensuelle", in Jerzy Makarczyk (Ed.), Theory of International Law at the Threshold of the 21st Century - Essays in Honour of Krzysztof Skubiszewski, Kluwer Law International, The Hague/London/Boston, 1996, p. 839. 2 The registration of an application or communication on the general list of a judicial or quasi-judicial organ may be defined as an "act of recognition which establishes that such a communication is indeed a seizure and, as of the date of receipt, actualises the introduction of the case", [Translation by the Registry] Carlo Santulli, Droit du contentieux international, LGDJ-Montchrestien, Paris, 2005, p. 400. 3 Rule 102 of the Rules of Procedure of the African Commission, as adopted on 6 October 1995, is worded as follows "Pursuant to these Rules of Procedure, the Secretary shall transmit to the Commission the communications submitted to him for consideration by the Commission in accordance with the Charter. 2. No communications concerning a State which is not a party to the Charter shall be received by the Commission or placed in a list under Rule 103 of the present Rules" (emphasis added), see http://www.achpr.org/français_/info/rules_fr.html (site consulted on 9 December 2009). When member States of the African Union had not all become parties to the African Charter, and the Commission received a communication against a State that was not a party to the Charter, the Commission limited itself to writing to the Applicant informing him/her that it has no jurisdiction to deal with the communication. It did not serve the communication on the State concerned, Evelyn A. Ankumah, The African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights - Practice and Procedures, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. The Hague/London/Boston, 1996, p.57. 4 "When an application is filed by simple letter, even where such application is complete, the practice of the Commission is to address an application form to the Applicant. The various points detailed in this form facilitate effective consideration of the admissibility of the application. The Applicant is requested to return this form duly completed and accompanied with the requisite annexes. The answers to some of the points could mention the elements already contained in the application. As a general rule (except in case of emergency), it is only after the receipt of the duly completed form that the application is entered on the Commission's list and given a serial number [...]. It is said that the entry on the list transforms a "petition" into an application in terms of Article 25 of the Convention" (emphasis added). Michel Melchior, << La procédure devant la Commission européenne des droits de I'Homme >> Michel Melchior (and others), lntroduire un recours a [sic] Strasbourg? Een Zaak Aanhangag Maken te Straastsburg? Nemesis Editions, Brussels, 1986, p. 24. 5 The jurisdiction of the Inter-American Commission in regard to communications from individuals now lies as of right in regard to all member States of the Organisation of American States irrespective of whether or not they are parties to the American Convention on Human Rights, see Rules 27 × Article 27. Condition for Considering the Petition - The Commission shall consider petitions regarding alleged violations of the human rights enshrined in the American Convention on Human Rights and other 5