I am grateful to many people for their mentorship, friendship and assistance throughout this project.
First, I owe a profound debt of gratitude to the then rector of the Sverdlovsk Juridical Institute (city of Sverdlovsk, Russia) Prof. D.D. Ostapenko, for accepting me into the postgraduate course many years ago, and who was also a mentor for my first thesis – a dissertation of a Candidate of Juridical Sciences. I am also in debt to Prof. G.V. Ignatenko, the head chair of foreign state and international law at that Institute, for his great support, thoughts and advisement in the course of preparing and defending my second thesis some years later – a dissertation of a Doctor of Juridical Sciences, as well as for our warm and friendly relationship during our many years of productive interaction and during my research and teaching activities.
My gratitude extends to colleagues from universities of other countries for inviting me to participate in research projects and contribute to the international books they edited – Prof. A. Nollkaemper (University of Amsterdam), Prof. A. Reinisch (University of Vienna), Prof. L. Malksoo (University of Tartu) and Prof. W. Benedek (University of Graz).
I am also very grateful to the following colleagues for their communication on different issues of international and national law – Prof. G. Nolte and Prof. H. Aust (during my research stay at the Berlin Humboldt University), the former Judge at the ICJ, Prof. V. S. Vereshchetin (Russia and the Netherlands); the former President of the Institute of International Law, Prof. R. Mullerson (Estonia); Prof. S. Yee (China), Prof. W. E. Butler (United States), the former Judge at the ECtHR, Prof. A.I. Kovler (Russia); Prof. D. Amoroso (Italy), as well as colleagues at the Institute of State and Law and the University of Tyumen (Russia) whom I have not mentioned here personally.
Last but not least, many thanks to the team from brill Publishers, Matthias Vanhullebusch, Anna Schmitt Nagelbach, Irene van Rossum, Elisa Perotti, Judy Pereira and Ingeborg van der Laan for their efforts, patience and enthusiasm in editing and helping me complete the manuscript, and to Jennifer Lehman for her highly professional language editing.