Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States, UNGA Res 2625 (XXV)

The Declaration's territorial-integrity paragraph is qualified by the 'safeguard clause': the prohibition on dismemberment applies to states 'conducting themselves in compliance with the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples and thus possessed of a government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction'. The safeguard clause is the textual hook every remedial-secession argument relies on; it has been read narrowly (most state practice) and broadly (some scholarship).