The Edinburgh Declaration was a declaration by the heads of government of the Commonwealth of Nations concerning the organisation's membership criteria. Part of the final communiqué issued at the end of the fifteenth Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), the Declaration was an endorsement of the report of the Inter-Governmental Group on Criteria for Commonwealth Membership (IGCCM). It was issued on 27 October 1997, in Edinburgh, the United Kingdom.
The report of the IGCCM consolidated all the membership criteria of the organisation, developed over two-thirds of a century, since the Statute of Westminster 1931, into a single document, beginning the process of codification.[1] Primarily, it was decided that the admission of Mozambique, in 1995, was a unique occurrence, in recognition of Mozambique's support for the Commonwealth's policies towards South Africa and Rhodesia during the Apartheid era; any future members would have to have a direct constitutional link with an existing member.[1]
In addition to this new rule, the former rules were consolidated into a single document. These requirements, which remain the same today, are that members must:
- accept and comply with the Harare principles.
- be fully sovereign states.
- recognise the King or Queen as the Head of the Commonwealth.
- accept the English language as the means of Commonwealth communication.
- respect the wishes of the general population vis-à-vis Commonwealth membership.[1]
- ^ a b c te Velde-Ashworth, Victoria (10 October 2005). "The future of the modern Commonwealth: Widening vs. deepening?" (PDF). Commonwealth Policy Studies Unit. Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 July 2007. Retrieved 25 July 2007.
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