World Court

The International Court of Justice (known colloquially as the World Court) is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations. Established in 1945, its main functions are to settle disputes submitted to it by states and to give advisory opinions on legal questions submitted to it by the General Assembly or Security Council, or by such specialized agencies as may be authorized to do so by the General Assembly in accordance with the United Nations Charter.

This court is different from the International Criminal Court and the War Crimes Law (Belgium) both of which has been confused with the International Court of Justice.

The seat of the Court is in The Hague, The Netherlands. It is composed of fifteen judges elected by the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council from a list of persons nominated by the national groups in the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Judges serve for nine years and may be re-elected. No two may be nationals of the same country. One-third of the Court is elected every three years. Each of the five permanent members of the Security Council (France, the People's Republic of China, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) have always had a judge on the Court. Questions before the Court are decided by a majority of judges present.

There are two distinct types of cases which the court rules on; contentious issues between states in which the court produces binding rulings between parties which submit to the court, and advisory opinions which are inherently non-binding.

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Contentious Issues

Only states may be parties in contentious cases before the International Court of Justice. This does not preclude private interests from being the subject of proceedings if one state brings the case against another. Jurisdiction of the court is limited only to cases where both parties have submitted their dispute to the court. Should either party fail "to perform the obligations incumbent upon it under a judgment rendered by the Court", the Security Council may be called upon to "make recommendations or decide upon measures" if the security council deems such actions necessary.

In practice, the Court's powers have been limited by the unwillingness of the convicted party to abide by the Court's ruling, or by the Security Council's unwillingness to enforce consequences.

However, in theory, "so far as the parties to the case are concerned, a judgment of the Court is binding, final and without appeal," and "by signing the Charter, a State Member of the United Nations undertakes to comply with any decision of the International Court of Justice in a case to which it is a party".

For example, the United States of America had previously accepted the Court's compulsory jurisdiction upon its creation in 1946 but withdrew its acceptance following the Court's judgment in 1984 that called on the US to "cease and to refrain" from the "unlawful use of force" against the government of Nicaragua. The court ruled the US was "in breach of its obligation under customary international law not to use force against another state" and was ordered to pay reparations (see note 2) , although it never did, (see: Nicaragua v. United States).

Examples of cases include:

A complaint by the United States in 1980 that Iran was detaining American diplomats in Tehran in violation of international law;
A dispute between Tunisia and Libya over the delimitation of the continental shelf between them
A dispute over the course of the maritime boundary dividing the U.S. and Canada in the Gulf of Maine area
A complaint by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia against the member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization regarding their actions in the Kosovo War

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Advisory Opinion

An advisory opinion is a function of the court open only to specified United Nations bodies and agencies. On receiving a request, the Court decides which States and organizations might provide useful information and gives them an opportunity of presenting written or oral statements. The Court's advisory procedure is otherwise modelled on that for contentious proceedings, and the sources of applicable law are the same. In principle the Court's advisory opinions are consultative in character and are therefore not binding as such on the requesting bodies. Certain instruments or regulations can, however, provide in advance that the advisory opinion shall be binding.

Examples of cases include:

Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice on the Israeli West Bank barrier
An advisory opinion on the legality of the use (or threat to use) nuclear weapons.

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